Dark Shadows: Elizabeth's Secret: Collinwood's Backyard
by WhyTK
Summary: Paul Stoddard brings an unwelcome guest to the great house of Collinwood.
1. Chapter 1

**_Dark Shadows: Elizabeth's Secret: _****"Collinwood's Backyard" **

**This is a prequel to Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows, _including the deleted scenes that are included on the Blu-Ray Disc. It is also a prequel to my fanfiction _Dark Shadows 2_, which I am still working on. **

**I do not own _Dark Shadows_ or any of its characters, institutions, or entities. **

"You know, honey ... everyone in this house has at least one big, scary secret.  
>Yours can't be all that bad." - Dr. Julia Hoffman to Miss Victoria Winters at the end of Scene 108, the last deleted scene on the Blu-Ray Disc of <em>Dark Shadows<em>

"Mommy, where's Daddy?  
>He's been gone for so long.<br>Is he ever coming home?" - Carolyn Stoddard introducing "The Ballad of Dwight Fry" at the Collinwood Happening, and Mommy does not look happy about it

October 1962  
><em>Carolyn Stoddard<br>_Carolyn Stoddard is 5 years old. She hates it when Mommy and Daddy fight. And they are fighting more and more lately. She especially hates it when they fight so bad that Daddy leaves. Sometimes he is gone for hours and comes home smelling and acting funny. Mommy calls it "Drunk."

To Carolyn, the way Daddy smells when he is "drunk" is the worst part. Everyone acted so surprised when they found out she had "supersensitive hearing." Grandpa gave her the nickname "Superears," like Superman. That was the only part she liked. She does not like it that the other kids at kindergarten are now scared of her. So she has kept her "supersensitive nose" (that is what they would call it if they knew, isn't it?) to herself.

Her supersensitive nose is worse than her supersensitive ears because of the Man Smell. Mommy says there are "Things That Ladies Don't Talk About." Carolyn has a feeling that the Man Smell is one of the "Things That Ladies Don't Talk About."

When Mommy takes Carolyn to town to go shopping, they often see bigger boys and girls holding hands. Mommy calls them "teenagers," and she says Carolyn will be a teenager someday and a boy will want to hold Carolyn's hand.

Carolyn has mixed feeling about this. She wants to be bigger, but she is not sure she wants a boy to hold her hand - because every teenager boy holding the hand of a teenager girl has the Man Smell on him. And the teenager girls have the Woman Smell on them.

Lots of men and teenager boys have the Man Smell on them when they look at Mommy, including the teenager boy who checks out their groceries. But Mommy never has the Woman smell on her when she looks at them.

Daddy used to have the Man Smell on him many times when he looked at Mommy. And Mommy had the Woman Smell on her, and the next morning Mommy and Daddy would smile at each other a lot at breakfast, and that would make Carolyn happy.

The same thing happens with Grandpa and Grandma. It used to happen with Mommy and Daddy more than with Grandpa and Grandma. Now it's the other way around, and somehow Carolyn knows it shouldn't be like that.

Daddy often has the Man Smell on him when looking at other women. It has always been that way, but lately he has the Man Smell more and more when looking at other women and less and less when looking at Mommy.

Daddy is the only man in "real life" that Mommy gets the Woman Smell on her when she looks at him. But she gets it when she looks at Tony Curtis in the movies and F-Rim Cymbalist, Jr. on _77 Sunset Strip_.

The worst was Uncle Roger and Aunt Laura's wedding. Uncle Roger had the Man Smell on him, and Aunt Laura had the Woman Smell on her, and Carolyn knew this was all right.

But every man in the church had the Man Smell too. It was all right that Grandpa had the Man Smell, because he was holding Grandma's hand and he kept looking at her and smiling. And Grandma had the Woman Smell and smiled back at Grandpa.

But Daddy had the Man Smell and never looked at Mommy. He just kept looking at Aunt Laura.

Carolyn fights it as long as she can. But then Mommy notices her squirming and whispers, "Carolyn, do you need to go to the restroom?"

Carolyn nods and Mommy takes her out to where the "Restrooms" are. Carolyn doesn't understand that name, she has never rested in a Ladies' Restroom.

When they get close to the Ladies' Restroom, Carolyn can't hold it anymore. She breaks free of Mommy's hand and runs the rest of the way.

Mommy sees that Carolyn does not close the door behind her and is puzzled. "She knows better than that," Mommy thinks.

And then she hears Carolyn retching.

Mommy runs the rest of the way and sees Carolyn bent over the toilet and vomiting like she will never stop.

"Carolyn! My God, Carolyn! What is it? Is it something you ate?" Mommy doubts this, they all had the same breakfast and the same lunch and she feels fine - except she is scared sick for her baby.

Carolyn is 5 now, and she hates it when Mommy calls her, "My baby."

"Water," Carolyn gasps. "Please, Mommy, water."

Mommy turns on the cold faucet and then picks Carolyn up. At age 5, she is nearly too heavy for Mommy to lift. But she must, and so she does.

Carolyn cups her hands under the stream of water. She rinses her mouth and then drinks and drinks. Finally she says, "Thank you, Mommy. You can put me down now."

Mommy puts Carolyn down. Then she wets a paper towel and turns off the water.

Carolyn is sweating and shaking, but her forehead does not feel hot when Mommy touches it with the back of her hand.

"Carolyn, what is it? What's wrong? Lots of people cry at weddings, including me. But this is the 1st time I've ever seen anyone throw up." She wipes the cool, wet paper towel over Carolyn's forehead and the back of her neck. This, and the fact that Mommy is doing it, make Carolyn feel better.

"We're missing it, Mommy. Please let's go back."

"Are you sure? Are you all right now?"

"Yes, Mommy. If I can sit in your lap."

They go back in and sit down, Carolyn in Mommy's lap. When Mommy puts her arms around her, Carolyn pulls Mommy's hand close to her face, where she can smell the perfume on Mommy's wrist. The perfume and the smell of Mommy herself covers up the Man Smell enough that she gets through the rest of the ceremony.

At the reception, Carolyn eats some wedding cake. But she asks for water instead of punch. She had some punch once, and it was sweet, and that sweet on top of the wedding cake would be too much. She might throw up again. She wishes she could have meat instead of cake.

After the reception, Uncle Roger and Aunt Laura leave on their "honeymoon," another name that Carolyn does not understand. The moon is made of silver cheese (people say it is made of green cheese, but if you look at the moon you can see that it is silver), so how can it be made of honey just because Uncle Roger and Aunt Laura are now married?

The morning after the wedding, Grandma and Grandpa leave to "mend fences" with the stores that Daddy sells fish to. Daddy broke the stores' fences and they won't buy any more fish until Grandma and Grandpa mend the fences. Grandma and Grandpa will be gone for 4 or 5 days.

The grocery stores in Collinsport don't have fences around them. Carolyn doesn't understand why the stores that Daddy sells fish to have fences, or how Daddy broke them. And if Daddy broke the fences, why do Grandma and Grandpa have to mend them?

Carolyn can tell that Mommy is mad about the fences that Daddy broke. Carolyn is afraid that Mommy and Daddy will fight about it. She does not want Daddy to leave and come back smelling drunk.

They do fight. But they put it off until late in the afternoon. Carolyn does not run after Daddy's green Jag-war. She use to run after it, crying, "Daddy! Please stop, Daddy! Come back!" But he never stopped, so she gave up running after him.

_Jason McGuire  
><em>Jason McGuire sits in the Blue Whale with a drink in his hand. He is just about to introduce himself to a young lady when he hears a vaguely familiar voice cry joyfully, "Jason! Jason McGuire!"

"Shit!" McGuire thinks. "Who the hell is that?" He has never been to Collinsport before, how can anyone here know him? And "Jason McGuire" is not the name he was going to use when he introduced himself to the young lady.

He turns to look, and sees a vaguely familiar face. It takes a few seconds, but then he tells himself, "It's that f***ing fool Paul Stoddard." Aloud he says, "Paul! What the hell are you doing here?"

"I live here! I first came to Collinsport out of curiosity, to see the little fishing village that Charity Trask was always talking about. I met Elizabeth Collins, one of the family the town is named for, and married her. Did you see the big house on the hill overlooking town? That's Collinwood, the Collins ancestral home.

"Elizabeth and I have a 5 year old daughter, Carolyn. Look, here's a picture of us all." He pulls out his wallet and shows McGuire the family photo they had taken on Carolyn's 5th birthday.

McGuire says, "Wow! Congratulations, Paul. That's a lovely family you've got." On the inside he says to himself, "Especially the little girl."

Aloud, McGuire says, "What a coincidence! I was curious about Charity's little fishing village too. I was in Boston on business. When it was finished, I had some time so I rented a car and drove up here. Hey, did anyone get into Charity's pants before graduation?"

"Oh, hell! Didn't you hear?"

"Hear what?"

"Charity was raped and murdered 2 months before graduation. They never caught the bastard who did it."

On the outside, McGuire makes the expected sounds of surprise and horror and outrage. On the inside, he is laughing his ass off.

Jason McGuire raped and murdered Charity Trask.

Charity Trask was the best human being the Trask family had produced in centuries. She lived up to her name. The names Faith, Hope, Chastity, and Honor would have been equally appropriate. So would the name Pietas, except Charity would have rejected it because it was pagan.

Charity never dated in high school or in college. Her plan had been to go to college and then to nursing school, and devote the rest of her life to God as a medical missionary.

McGuire thought Charity rejected his advances out of snobbery. It was one thing for her to say "No" when a wimp like Stoddard asked her for a date, but she had no right to say "No" to a MAN like McGuire.

The name Courage would have been appropriate too, as McGuire learned when he kidnapped Charity.

McGuire had returned to campus after 3 years. The place was big enough that it was unlikely anyone would recognize him after an absence of 3 years. But to make sure, he had grown a beard. He had dyed the beard and his hair black and put on a pair of prop spectacles purchased from a theater supply house. He pointed his gun at Charity from inside his modified overcoat and said, "Come with me. If you scream or run, I will kill you."

He was shocked when Charity said, "No. If it is God's will that I die now by your hand, then shoot me and be done with it."

McGuire was shocked, but he adjusted quickly. "OK. I won't kill you. I'll kill them." He tilted his head to show Charity who he meant.

Charity looked in that direction and saw a young professor and his wife. They always took a walk this time of day - pushing their 2 month old son in a baby carriage.

Charity obeyed McGuire.

Charity shocked McGuire again when he raped her and discovered that she really was a virgin. He wondered if all that devotion to God talk of hers was true. She was not his 1st virgin, but she was his 1st college girl. He had reserved that "honor" for her.

When McGuire was finished, he put Charity's body in the trunk of a stolen car and abandoned the car at the airport of a neighboring city. He took a taxi from the airport to downtown, where he stole the 1st car he found with the keys in it. He never had to look very far to find such a car. His most recent such find is the brand new, red Cadillac convertible now parked outside the Blue Whale. He had stolen it in downtown Boston after abandoning another stolen car with another body in the trunk at the Boston airport.

Charity had died in agony to save the lives of the young professor and his wife and their baby. McGuire had pissed on her grave by returning 6 months later to kill them in their home. How he had laughed about that.

Jason McGuire raped and killed Charity Trask. And now he must kill Paul Stoddard for recognizing him. He will enjoy killing Paul. He will enjoy raping and killing Elizabeth and Carolyn even more. They will not be his 1st mother and daughter double event.

Paul and McGuire drink and talk about old times. Paul lies and brags about being a successful salesman for the Collins Canning Company. This goes on until Paul realizes that it is almost time for dinner at Collinwood. He decides to surprise Elizabeth and delight Carolyn by returning home in time for dinner. And just as McGuire expected, Paul invites him home for dinner - and to spend the night at the great house of Collinwood.

_Carolyn Stoddard  
><em>Carolyn is overjoyed when she hears Daddy's car coming back so early. She runs to the front door and opens it.

Mommy follows slowly.

Carolyn sees Daddy's car coming. She runs toward the circular driveway, but stops short of it. She knows Mommy doesn't want her close to the driveway when a car is moving, so she stops before Mommy can yell at her. There is another car behind Daddy's car, a red car with a roof that goes down just like the roof on Daddy's car. She smiles and waves at Daddy.

But then she sees the man in the red car. She stops smiling and takes a step back. As Daddy and the stranger get out of their cars, the wind shifts. The stranger looks at Carolyn and smiles.

Daddy and the stranger both smell drunk.

Carolyn has often wondered if a man would ever have the Man Smell on him when he looked at her. This man is looking at her and he has the Man Smell on him.

Carolyn runs back to Mommy. She hides behind Mommy and clutches Mommy's dress and peeks around Mommy at Daddy and the stranger. She has never done this before, except the few times in town when they ran into Miss Boo-card (Carolyn thinks that is a funny name, even though she is afraid of Miss Boo-card), and the fewer times they ran into the Grimes Twins.

"Elizabeth, this is Jason McGuire, an old college buddy of mine. I ran into him at the Blue Whale. He came to Colllinsport for the same reason I did, curiosity about Charity Trask's little fishing village. Small world, huh? I invited him to spend the night with us.

"Jason, this is my wife Elizabeth and our daughter Carolyn. Carolyn, don't be shy, come say 'Hello' to Mr. McGuire."

Still clutching Mommy's dress, Carolyn takes a step back, trying to pull Mommy with her. But Mommy stands fast. This is her home and she will not retreat before a stranger, even if Carolyn is afraid of him.

"Pleased to met you, Lizzie," McGuire says, extending his hand.

"Please don't call me 'Lizzie'," Elizabeth replies coldly. She shakes hands with McGuire, she is too polite to refuse that much. But then she says, "Mr. McGuire, I am sorry to be a poor hostess, but I can not allow you to stay the night at Collinwood. You may join us for dinner, but then you must go."

"What the hell, Elizabeth?! Jason is my friend, I invited him."

"Paul, our daughter is not afraid of the dark. She is not afraid of thunder or Nor-Easters. She is not afraid of big barking dogs or wild animals - they are afraid of her. She is not afraid of people, except for Anglelique Bouchard, and the Grimes Twins ... and now Mr. McGuire. I respect her fear, and you should too.

"Mr. McGuire, I'm sorry. I don't know why Carolyn is afraid of you, but she is. I can not and will not be hospitable to you at the cost of frightening Carolyn. I repeat: you may stay for dinner, but then you must go. I suggest you use the telephone to make a reservation at the Collinsport Inn or one of the motels."

Mommy turns half-way around and holds out her hand. "Come, Carolyn."

Carolyn grabs Mommy's hand and they go into the house. Carolyn looks back over her shoulder several times, ready to break loose from Mommy and run if McGuire is too close behind them.

_Jason McGuire  
><em>McGuire thinks, "Paul is pussy-whipped, I should have known. But the wife and daughter, I'm gonna enjoy them. And this house ... this will be my biggest fire yet."

Dinner is pot roast, but the toughest McGuire has ever chewed. Paul apologizes to him for it. Lizzie chews and chews but says nothing.

But pretty little Carolyn seems to have no trouble with it. She cleans her plate with astounding speed, and then asks Lizzie if she may be excused.

Lizzie is astonished. "Don't you want seconds or desert?"

McGuire thinks, "Seconds? On this shit?"

"No, Mommy. I just want to go to bed."

"Carolyn, are you sick?" She feels Carolyn's forehead.

"No, Mommy."

"All right. You go brush your teeth and put on your night gown. I'll be up in a few minutes."

"Yes, Mommy."

Carolyn goes around the table to kiss her Daddy goodnight.

McGuire says, "How about a kiss goodnight for me?"

Carolyn runs out of the room, while Lizzie glares at McGuire.

"Fast little bitch," McGuire thinks. He is also puzzled. A little kid who doesn't want desert? A little kid who wants to go to bed early? She really is scared of him. He has no idea how Carolyn knows she should be scared of him, but he will prove her fears justified soon enough.

Lizzie soon finishes her dinner too. Like Carolyn, she does not stick around for desert. She stands and says, "Good-bye, Mr. McGuire."

McGuire is thinking, "Before I kill Paul and Lizzie, I will have to find out who the Grimes Twins are. Maybe they are identical twin girls. I've never done twins before."

_Carolyn Stoddard  
><em>Mommy stands behind her kneeling daughter and listens as Carolyn says her prayers.

God bless Mommy and Daddy.  
>God bless Grandma and Grandpa.<br>God bless Uncle Roger and Aunt Laura, and please give them a baby I can pretend is my baby brother or baby sister.

Last night was the 1st time Carolyn said, "Aunt Laura" instead of "Miss Laura." Last night was also when she added the part about giving a baby to Roger and Laura. Carolyn doesn't know it, but Mommy had winced at that part, painfully aware that there was less and less of a chance of a real baby brother or baby sister for Carolyn.

God bless Mrs. Johnson and Mr. Willie.

And Carolyn adds some things tonight.

"Please help Grandma and Grandpa mend the fences Daddy broke. Please bring them home safe and sound. And please make Mr. McGuire go away and never come back. Amen."

"Amen," says Mommy. She tucks Carolyn in, tells her a story, and sings "Millicent's Lullaby" to her. Then mother and daughter kiss each other good night and Elizabeth goes back downstairs.

As soon as Mommy is gone, Carolyn gets out of bed and goes to her toybox. She gets her six-shooter. It only shoots caps, not real bullets like Grandpa's six-shooter. But the people on TV sometimes kill people by hitting them on the head with a blunt-instamint, like a gun butt, instead of shooting them with guns or stabbing them with knives. Carolyn does not understand why a gun-butt is called a gun butt. It doesn't look anything like her own butt.

Carolyn's six-shooter is made of steel, so it is hard and heavy, at least by her standards. If Mr. McGuire comes to Carolyn's room, she hill hit him on the head with her blunt-instamint. She gets back into bed, pulls up the covers, and gets a tight grip on the barrel of her six-shooter.

She waits for Daddy to come and kiss her good night. She prays Mr. McGuire does not come with him.

_Elizabeth Collins Stoddard  
><em>Elizabeth finds Paul and McGuire having a drink in the drawing room. Both of them are drunker than when they arrived.

Elizabeth does not put it off. "Mr. McGuire! When I said you must leave after dinner, that did not include an after dinner drink. Good-bye, Mr. McGuire."

"Liz, Jason is my friend. I invited him to spend the night, he's spending the night. Tell Willie to get a room ready."

"And Carolyn is your daughter - your DAUGHTER! You put her first, or you are not fit for her to call you 'Daddy' ."

It goes downhill from there. And even though the immediate cause of this argument is a new one for Elizabeth and Paul, it quickly goes into a well worn rut.

As usual, there comes a point when Elizabeth wants to slap Paul. Whenever she feels like this, she looks for something else for her hand to do. This time, she picks up the poker to stir up the fire, even though it doesn't need stirring.

And then Paul makes one crack too many about Elizabeth's parents.

Elizabeth spins around and swings the poker backhanded at the right side of Paul's head. She tries to "pull her punch" at the last second, but it is too late. The poker hits Paul in the right temple. He drops his drink and falls to the floor.

For the 1st time in her life, Elizabeth panics. She runs from the room. As she runs, she hears McGuire laughing.

When Elizabeth reaches the room she shares with Paul, she paces the floor and cries and asks herself, "What do I do now?"

She has to call the police of course. And they will arrest her, and she will disgrace her family ... and McGuire will come back to Collinsport to testify at her trial. Even if she pleads guilty to avoid a trial, he can still come back whenever he chooses and wait for a chance to rape Carolyn.

"Maine has no death penalty," she tells herself. "The most I can get is life imprisonment. I only have one lifetime to give for my baby, so I will give it for killing McGuire as well as Paul. Carolyn will hate me for killing her Daddy. Maybe she will forgive me if I kill McGuire too."

Elizabeth opens her wardrobe and looks at her shotgun. "No," she tells herself. "There's a better way." She grabs her keys from her purse and steps into the hall.

At age 5, Carolyn is still in a room on the main hall. She will not insist on moving into the tower room until puberty hits, with unexpected side effects.

Elizabeth slowly opens the door of Carolyn's room. Carolyn is asleep, her breathing slow and regular. Elizabeth closes the door and goes to her parents' room.

Carolyn is not asleep. She learned long ago how to make her breathing slow and regular, even when she is wide awake and tears are trickling out of her eyes.

In her parents' room, Elizabeth unlocks her father's desk. Mr. Collins entrusted his daughter with copies of all of his keys when she was only 12. He has yet to entrust his son with any, except the front door. She takes Dad's revolver from the top right drawer. It is a .32 Colt New Police, a model so old that it has the hard rubber grips with the name "COLT" in an oval at the top of them.

The Colt will make less noise and less of a mess than Elizabeth's shotgun. Less noise is imprtant to Elizabeth because of Carolyn's "Superears." And she wants to minimize the mess that Willie and Mrs. Johnson will have to clean up when the police are finished.

Elizabeth swings out the cylinder to check if the pistol is loaded - it is, as always. She leaves her keys on the desk, she will not need them ever again, and heads back to the drawing room.

_Jason McGuire  
><em>Elizabeth enters the drawing room with the intention of simply shooting McGuire - 3 shots in the heart and 3 more in the head to be sure - and then calling the police to report both killings. But then she notices that Paul's body is gone.

She points the pistol at McGuire's face and asks, "Where's the body?"

McGuire is silent for a few seconds. Then he says, "I carried it out to his car, put it in the trunk. For $10,000 and ... a little personal attention ... I'll drive the car off the end of the boat ramp in Collinsport. Then I'll go away and you'll never see me again." He never takes his eyes off the gun in Elizabeth's hand.

Now it is Elizabeth who does not speak for a few seconds. "What do you mean 'personal attention' ?"

"It's getting late and I've had a few drinks. It'll be even later when we get back from the boat ramp."

"We?"

"I'll be taking enough of a chance driving Paul's car to the boat ramp in my current condition. I shouldn't try to drive to a motel after that. So I drive Paul's car, you follow in yours and then drive me back here for that personal attention."

"I repeat, what do you mean 'personal attention' ?"

To Elizabeth, McGuire says, "A night in bed with you, of course." To himself he says, "The 1st of _many_ nights in bed with you ... and later with your pretty little girl."

Elizabeth stares at him for a long time. Then she says, "It's a deal. I'll write you a check."

"No check! It has to be cash."

"We don't keep that kind of cash in the house. I'll go to the bank with you tomorrow, so they will not give you any trouble about cashing it. And if we get caught, I want to be sure you go down with me. The cancelled check will be proof that I paid you for ... _something_. It'll be my word, the word of a Collins, against yours that I paid you to dump Paul's body."

McGuire thinks, "This is too easy. Even with the bank, this is too easy. I thought she would try to Jew me down on the price, that she would say OK to the money but no to the f***ing. But it will be OK when I get the gun away from her." Aloud he says, "It's a deal. Why don't you put the gun down?"

"On the desk, when I write the check. But first ... " With her left hand, Elizabeth picks up the poker and returns it to its place, in the front of the wood bin to the right of the fire place. Still using her left hand, she reaches into the wood bin, picks up a small log, and throws it on the fire. She reaches for a 2nd log. The gun is still in her right hand, and her back is completely turned to McGuire.

McGuire is drunk, but that has never interfered with his ability to beat up a woman. "I will just have to be a little careful until I get the gun," he thinks. "I will have to do something special with that gun to punish Eliz-a-bitch for pointing it at me. When I'm finished with Carolyn, I will f*** her to death with the gun and make Eliz-a-bitch watch."

McGuire rises slowly from the sofa, still holding his drink. He might need to throw it at Elizabeth. He takes one short, silent step toward Elizabeth, and then a 2nd. He raises his foot to take the 3rd step.

Elizabeth throws the 2nd log onto the fire. She picks up a 3rd log. She picks up this one by the end instead of the middle. And then she turns halfway around and throws the log backhanded into McGuire's face. She heard the old sofa creak when McGuire stood up. She was waiting for that creak.

The log is a very small one and it startles McGuire even more than it hurts him. He yelps and staggers back a step. The next thing he sees, and the last thing he sees, blurred by eyes that are watering with pain, is Elizabeth with the poker in her left hand, raised over her head. Then the poker slams into the top of his head.

McGuire drops his drink.

_Elizabeth Collins Stoddard  
><em>The 1st blow drives McGuire down to his knees. The 2nd blow lays him out on the stone floor. Elizabeth continues hitting McGuire's head until she feels his skull cave in, then 3 more times to be sure.

Elizabeth's father had taught her, "If you ever have to defend yourself with some kind of a club, don't stop swinging it until the enemy's brains are dripping off the end of it." She had thought about that advice many times, and had come to the conclusion that dripping brains would be pretty messy. She had decided that once the skull gave way, every blow after that would be like hitting the brain itself. She had spoken to her father about it, and he had agreed with her.

The gun was pointed at McGuire's belly during the 1st blow, with Elizabeth's finger on the trigger and ready to pull it if McGuire had blocked the poker.

Elizabeth shoves the poker deep into the fire, to burn off every trace of hair and skin and blood, both Paul's and McGuire's. Then she turns to the corpse and speaks to it.

"You ignorant piece of shit. The water at the end of the Collinsport boat ramp is only 4 feet deep at mean low water. At spring tide, even a low car like the Jaguar would be clearly visible. But thank you for reminding me that Collinwood's backyard is the Atlantic Ocean."

**NOTES  
><strong>Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows _was a Warner Brothers Picture. _77 Sunset Strip _(1958-1964) was a Warner Brothers Television Production, starring Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. Both _77 Sunset Strip_ and the original _Dark Shadows_ were broadcast by ABC.

The line, "If you ever have to defend yourself with some kind of a club, don't stop swinging it until the enemy's brains are dripping off the end of it," is paraphrased from _The Revengers _(1982), one of the Matt Helm novels by Donald Hamilton.


	2. Chapter 2 Good riddance to bad rubbish

**_Dark Shadows: _****_Elizabeth_****_'s Secret: _Chapter ****2"Good riddance to bad rubbish"**

**This is a prequel to Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows, _including the deleted scenes that are included on the Blu-Ray Disc. It is also a prequel to my fanfiction _Dark Shadows 2_, which I am still working on. **

**I do not own _Dark Shadows_ or any of its characters, institutions, or entities. **

"You know, honey ... everyone in this house has at least one big, scary secret.  
>Yours can't be all that bad." - Dr. Julia Hoffman to Victoria Winters at the end of Scene 108, the last deleted scene on the Blu-Ray Disc of <em>Dark Shadows<em>

"Mommy, where's Daddy?  
>He's been gone for so long.<br>Is he ever coming home?" - Carolyn Stoddard introducing "The Ballad of Dwight Fry" at the Collinwood Happening

October 1962  
>Elizabeth Collins Stoddard has 2 cars and 2 corpses to dispose of. She will need help.<p>

She fetches an old towel - NOT one of the towels with a fancy letter "C" for Collinwood monogrammed on it - and wraps it around McGuire's head to minimize the blood on the floor. She is surprised by how much blood there is. She looks at the spot where Paul fell. There is much less blood there. She wonders why.

She searches McGuire's body. She will need the keys to his Cadillac, and the keys to Paul's Jaguar. She starts with the outside pockets of McGuire's sports coat, reasonable places for Paul's keys. She finds money, 2 stacks of currency in each pocket. Each stack is held together by a rubber band.

She also finds 2 switchblades, one in each pocket. "What the hell?" she thinks.

She unbuttons McGuire's sports coat, to get better access to his pants pockets. The 1st thing she sees when the coat falls open is a gun, a Smith and Wesson snub-nosed .38. It is stuck in McGuire's pants, forward of his left hip.

Elizabeth feels her gorge rising. She looks around almost frantically, as close to frantic as she is capable of being, and then barfs on McGuire's chest. When they wrap him up, the vomit will go with him.

She runs to the nearest bathroom. She rinses her mouth and then drinks one handful of water after another. "Like daughter, like mother," she thinks.

Then she runs to the linen closet for another old towel. She lays it over the vomit on McGuire's chest, to soak up the most liquid part of it before they roll him up in an old sheet.

"Why didn't he shoot me in the back when he had the chance?" she asks herself. "Because he wanted to rape me 1st, of course. But why didn't he pull his gun when I turned my back, and tell me to drop mine? Arrogance? Was he that sure he could jump me before I shot him?"

Elizabeth swings out the cylinder of the gun, and sees that all 5 chambers are loaded. She lays it on the floor, next to the switchblades and the pile of money.

She searches the inside pockets of McGuire's sports coat. Each pocket contains a wallet and another stack of rubber-banded money. 2 wallets. Does that mean 2 driver's licenses under 2 different names? She does not look. She does not want to add to the guilty knowledge she already has. She just removes the money from the wallets and then returns them to the pockets.

She finds the Cadillac keys in McGuire's right-front pants pocket, just as she expected. But in the left-front pocket, she finds more money, a smaller stack than the others and without a rubber band this time. But not Paul's keys.

On a hunch, she checks the left hip pocket of McGuire's pants. She is not surprised to find a third wallet. Does that mean a 3rd driver's license under a 3rd name? As before, she does not look. She just removes the money and puts the wallet in the outside-left pocket of the sports coat, rather than go near his ass again.

Where the hell are Paul's keys? Elizabeth has the other set of keys for the Jag, they are in her purse, so driving it is no problem. But Paul's keys must not be found at Collinwood after she tells people, especially Carolyn, that Paul has deserted his family.

And then she remembers the difference between the trunk of her father's Cadillac sedan (an older one than McGuire's convertible) and the trunk of Paul's Jaguar roadster. You open the trunk of her father's Cadillac by putting the key in the keyhole and turning it. The Jag has a handle that you turn, and that handle can be left unlocked. If it was unlocked when McGuire carried Paul's body outside, then he would not have needed the keys to put the body in the trunk. The dumb-ass put Paul's corpse in the trunk with the keys still in the corpse's pocket. Which means Elizabeth will have to dig them out.

She re-buttons the sports coat over the towel and the vomit.

The secret room that holds her macrame is not much of a secret anymore, but there is a secret compartment inside it that is known only to Elizabeth and her parents. She puts her father's .32, McGuire's .38 and the switchblades in that compartment.

There is a chart of the local waters in the drawing room, and Elizabeth spreads it out on her father's desk, the one in the windowed alcove. She knows there is a deep spot, called "Devil's Deep," to the Southeast, straight out to sea from Collinwood, but she has to refresh her memory about the exact location. There is good fishing there, but the shape of the bottom forbids a commercial fishing boat from dragging its net through the area - and maybe snagging something on the bottom. She makes mental notes of the bearings from that spot to Collinwood and to the lighthouse to the Northeast, then stows the chart.

She turns the poker 180 degrees to make sure every side is burned clean.

Elizabeth runs upstairs. She reclaims her keys from her father's desk. She gets her keys to the Jag and a pair of gloves. And then back downstairs and down the back-hall and up the backstairs to the servants' quarters, to Willie's room.

Willie is deep in a drunken sleep and it takes a lot of shaking to awaken him. He blinks at Elizabeth and finally slurs, "Miss Elizabeth? What are you doing here?"

"I killed Paul. His friend McGuire saw me do it and tried to blackmail me, so I killed him too. Will you help me get rid of their bodies and their cars?"

Willie shocks Elizabeth by saying, "Good for you, Miss Elizabeth."

"What?!"

"Mr. Stoddard was a louse and his friend was worse. I didn't like the way he looked at little Miss Carolyn. I'll be proud to help you."

Elizabeth thinks, "Even Willie could see it, but Paul couldn't." She tells Willie, "We'll need the boat. Also 2 concrete blocks, some rope, and 2 old sheets."

"Yes, Miss Elizabeth."

"But we have to move the cars to the boathouse 1st. You know how sensitive Carolyn's ears are ... "

"Sure, Mr. Dan calls her 'Superears.' "

"Yes. I'll bet she's wide awake, waiting for the sound of McGuire driving away and scared sick by the thought that he hasn't left yet. I'll drive Paul's car and you follow in McGuire's Cadillac."

"Yes, Miss Elizabeth."

"Wear your gloves," she says, holding up her own gloves. "Don't leave any finger prints."

"Yes, Miss Elizabeth."

Willie gets dressed while Elizabeth waits for him near the front door. They go out the front door and walk toward the circular driveway. But while still on the front porch, Elizabeth jerks to a stop and says, "What the hell?"

Paul's Jaguar is gone.

Willie looks where Miss Elizabeth is looking, and sees the empty gap between Miss Elizabeth's Chevy station wagon and McGuire's Caddy. "Where's Mr. Stoddard's car?" he asks.

"Son of a bitch!"

"Yes he was, but where's his car?"

"He drove away in it."

"What?!"

"He's not dead, I didn't kill him. No wonder I couldn't find his keys on McGuire's body. I stunned him and scared him and when he woke up he drove away somewhere. He drove away and left his wife and his little girl alone with McGuire. And I killed McGuire for nothing."

"No, Miss Elizabeth. You killed him for blackmailing you. And he was blackmailing you for something you didn't even do, which is even worse. And you killed him for looking at little Miss Carolyn the way he did."

"Oh my, God! Carolyn!"

"What about Miss Carolyn?!"

"She heard her father drive away, but NOT McGuire driving away! She knows her father is gone and that McGuire is still in the house! She must be scared to death!"

"But he's dead now, he can't hurt her."

"Carolyn doesn't know that! And she never will. I have to move McGuire's car so Carolyn will hear it leaving. I'll move it down to the boathouse where Paul won't see it if he comes back before we ditch it. Then I'll talk to Carolyn and change my clothes. Then we'll ditch McGuire's car.

"Take your truck and get a concrete block. We only need one of them now. Then park as close to the kitchen door as you can. I'll meet you in the drawing room after I talk to Carolyn. If you get there before I do, start cleaning up. Clean up the blood and the broken glass. Don't touch McGuire's body, I'll deal with it." She gives Willie a few more instructions.

"Yes, Miss Elizabeth."

Elizabeth puts the top up on McGuire's red Cadillac convertible before she starts the engine. She knows that even if Carolyn is asleep, which she doubts, the starter will awaken her and she will look out the window to see if the car really drives away. And Carolyn must not see her mother driving McGuire's car.

The boathouse is just south of the rocky beach where Barnabas will read _Love Story_ to Victoria Winters 10 years later. It is at the bottom of a steep road that intersects Collinwood's driveway a few yards outside the circular drive in front of the manor. A few yards down that road, Elizabeth realizes that if she drives all the way to the boathouse, she will have to walk all the way back – uphill, in high heels. She stops the car and sets the parking brake as tight as she can.

Elizabeth gets out of the Cadillac and memorizes the Massachusetts license number on its tail. Then she hurries back into the house, and up the stairs. At the door of Carolyn's room, Elizabeth calls softly, "Carolyn?"

"Yes, Mommy." The reply comes too quickly for Carolyn to have just awakened. Elizabeth is not surprised that Carolyn is awake, but she doesn't say anything about it.

Elizabeth comes in and switches on the light. She sees the tears on her baby's little face. "Carolyn." She sits on the edge of the bed. They hug each other. "Don't be afraid. Mommy's here."

"I heard Daddy's car start up. I went to the window and watched him drive away. He drove away and never kissed me 'Good Night' ! But Mr. McGuire's car was still here, he didn't drive away when Daddy did. I didn't hear his car start up until just a minute ago."

Her voice is trembling, she is close to crying again. Carolyn never cries over physical pain, not even when she skins her knee or bumps her head or gets a shot at the doctor's office. Only emotional pain can make her cry - which means she cries a great deal.

"Mr. McGuire is a rude and stubborn man. I reminded him that he's not spending the night here. And I told him he is not even welcome to have a drink here when your Daddy isn't home. But he is rude and stubborn and it took me awhile to make him leave."

"I don't like Mr. McGuire, Mommy. Will he come back when Daddy comes back?" The trembling in Carolyn's voice is worse now.

"If he does, I won't let him set foot in this house again. I promise. I don't like him either." This is one promise that will be easy to keep.

"Good." Carolyn's voice is firmer now.

"Carolyn, I have to go out for a while. Mrs. Johnson will bolt the door behind me to make sure no one gets in. You go back to sleep."

"Will you bring Daddy back with you?"

"Yes ... if I find him." If she doesn't find him, it will not be the 1st time.

"OK. Good night, Mommy."

"Good night, honey." They kiss each other good night.

Carolyn is soon asleep for real. But her hand still has a tight grip on the barrel of her six-shooter.

There are things to do before awakening Mrs. Johnson. Elizabeth writes down the Massachusetts license number of McGuire's car. "McGuire is alive and I am afraid of him," she tells herself over and over again.

She changes her clothes, putting on slacks, a sweater, a jacket, and boat shoes. She gets a pocket compass from the top drawer of her bureau. It's a good one, her father gave it to her when she was a Girl Scout. She puts it in the left pocket of her jacket. He also gave her a pocket knife, which she now slips into the pocket of her slacks. She sticks a flashlight in the back pocket of her slacks.

She gets a grocery bag from the kitchen before she joins Willie in the drawing room. She puts the money in the grocery bag and then helps Willie to clean up the blood.

"Miss Elizabeth, where did the puke on his chest come from?"

"From me after I found a gun stuck in his pants. He could have shot me. I was so frightened I vomited." She laughs. "He was dead, and _then_ I was frightened of him."

They clean up the blood - where the poker fell, where Paul feel, where McGuire fell - with paper towels and Windex. They throw the paper towels in the fire, where they dry and then burn. Elizabeth also cleans the floor in the front of the wood bin, where the poker briefly stood before she hit McGuire with it. She removes the poker from the fire and puts it back in front of the wood bin.

She retrieves the .32, the .38, and the switchblades from the secret compartment, without letting Willie see it. She puts the .38 in her right jacket pocket. She drops the switchblades in the grocery bag. When she is in front of Willie again, she pats her right jacket pocket and says, "Willie, this is McGuire's gun. If Paul comes back as I am driving away in McGuire's car, I will kill him with McGuire's gun."

"That's fine with me, Miss Elizabeth."

They roll up the corpse in an old sheet, and Willie secures it in place with rope.

Elizabeth drapes an old towel over Willie's left shoulder, to protect his clothes from any vomit that gets past the sheet and the towel on McGuire's chest. Willie hoists the corpse onto his left shoulder - and then he sweats and shakes.

"This is how I carried Mr. Dan and them other 2 fellas out of ... out of ..."

Actually it was the fireman's carry that Willie used to carry Mr. Collins and 2 other wounded men out of the burning compartment, but this position is close enough to trigger the flashback.

"Willie!" Elizabeth grabs Willie's left hand with both of her hands and squeezes it tight. "Willie! This is Collinwood, not the ship! And there is no fire! Miss Elizabeth is here, she was not on the ship! And there is no fire, Willie!"

Willie's teeth are clenched and tears are leaking out of his tightly shut eyes. His shaking slows, but does not stop completely. He opens his eyes and looks at Elizabeth. "OK, Miss Elizabeth. Can we go now, this bastard's gettin' heavy?"

"Of course, Willie." Elizabeth leads the way, opening doors as she goes. They go out the back door of the kitchen and Willie drops the corpse in the bed of his truck.

"Willie, I left McGuire's car part way down the road to the boathouse. Stop behind it and wait for me. I must speak to Mrs. Johnson before we go."

"Yes, Miss Elizabeth."

Elizabeth goes to Mrs. Johnson's room and knocks on the door. Mrs. Johnson puts down her Gothic romance paperback and opens the door.

"Yes, Miss Elizabeth?"

"Mrs. Johnson, Willie and I have to go out to ... to run an urgent errand. I have to ask you to stand sentry duty until I get back. If Mr. Stoddard comes back while I am gone, do NOT let him in. We had a terrible fight and I'm afraid he might take Carolyn and leave me. Bolt the door behind me and don't let anyone in until I return."

Elizabeth holds out her father's old Colt to Mrs. Johnson. "And if anyone breaks in, shoot him. That includes Mr. Stoddard."

Mrs. Johnson sneers at the .32 and then turns to her wardrobe. She takes out a double-barreled 12 gauge shotgun. It is so old it has exposed hammers. "I can do better with this, Miss Elizabeth."

Elizabeth doesn't argue with her. She just asks, "May I leave the pistol here until I get back?"

"Yes, Ma'am. Put it in the top drawer of the bureau."

Mrs. Johnson locks and bolts the back door behind Elizabeth, and then checks every door and window on the ground floor. And then she marches around the ground floor with the shotgun at port arms, checking the doors and windows again on every round.

Elizabeth can move faster in her boat shoes than she could in her high heels. She runs to McGuire's car (it's the 1st time in years that she has run), and drives it to the boathouse. Willie follows in his truck, with the corpse in the back.

In the boathouse, Willie drops the body into the boat - the same boat he and Barnabas will use on a similar mission 10 years later. He then ties a rope to a concrete block, leftover from a project that went unfinished when Mr. Dan ran out of money for it. There are also bricks and other things leftover. He lowers the block into the boat. Elizabeth is in the boat to guide the block to a soft landing on a piece of canvas so it will not damage the hull. Willie drops the rest of the rope into the boat, and Elizabeth ties the loose end of it around McGuire's ankles.

Then she searches the Cadillac for anything that mentions Paul or the Collins family. There is nothing like that. No notes, letters, or newspaper clippings. But there is a brand new Maine Official Highway Map on the front seat. It has been refolded to show the route to Collinsport. Elizabeth adds the map to the grocery bag. There is a briefcase and a suitcase in the trunk. Elizabeth and Willie carry them into the boathouse, where there is enough light to examine them.

The briefcase contains another gun, a Beretta Model 1935 .32 automatic, and 2 more switchblades. There is also more money. It is in bundles held by rubber bands, the same as most of the money in McGuire's pockets.

The briefcase also contains a roll of adhesive tape and many pieces of 1/8-inch rope. The tape is 2-inches wide - wide enough to seal a human mouth. Elizabeth lifts one of the ropes. It is long enough to bind a pair of human limbs.

"What's all the rope for?" Willie asks.

Elizabeth runs to the edge of the wharf and vomits again, this time into the water.

"Jeeez, Miss Elizabeth! Are you all right?"

"Just frightened again. And I won't tell you why he had all that rope. It's guilty knowledge."

"What's guilty knowledge?"

"Guilty knowledge is something you know because you are guilty of something. For example, I know how McGuire died because I killed him. And the more guilty knowledge you have about something, the harder it is to pretend you know nothing."

There is a hose in the boathouse. Elizabeth turns on the water and rinses her mouth, and then drinks and drinks. When she was a little girl, she loved the rubbery taste of hose water. Now it will always remind her of tonight.

The suitcase contains some clothes, 2 more switchblades, a Luger, boxes of ammo for all 3 guns - and more money than McGuire's pockets and briefcase combined.

"_Holy_ shit!" says Willie.

"Willie, get me 2 bricks please."

There is a small tool room in the boathouse. While Willie goes out to get the bricks, Elizabeth fetches a hammer, a chisel, and a bucket from the tool room. She unloads the Beretta and the Luger, removing their magazines and ejecting the rounds in their chambers. She puts all this ammo in the bucket, then she adds the 3 boxes of ammo from the suitcase, 5 of the switchblades, and the Beretta and the Luger. The loaded .38 stays in her jacket pocket. She puts the last switchblade in the pocket of her slacks.

"If I fall overboard with all this metal on me, I'll sink like a rock," she thinks.

She takes the money from the both the briefcase and the suitcase and adds it to the grocery bag.

She uses the hammer and chisel to punch holes in the suitcase and the briefcase. She ties one end of a rope to the handle of the suitcase. She threads the rope through the handle of the briefcase and knots it again.

When Willie returns with the bricks, Elizabeth puts one in each case. Then she hands the bucket to Willie and picks up the grocery bag.

"Follow me, Willie." She leads him up to the 2nd floor of the boathouse, which is filled with junk. Most of it should have been thrown away years ago, even decades ago. But her father (like his father before him, and his father before that) is a pack rat. They hide the bucket and the bag among the junk. They will deep-six the guns and ammo at the same time as McGuire's body. Elizabeth will examine the money more closely later and decide if it is safe to keep it.

At Elizabeth's order, Willie removes his lobster trap from the forward section of the boat to make room for McGuire's luggage. He is about to remove the box in which he stores the lobsters when Elizabeth's says, "No, Willie, leave the box. We'll lay the corpse on it so we don't have to hoist it all the way over the side in one lift."

"OK, Miss Elizabeth."

Elizabeth gets back in the boat. Willie lowers the suitcase and the briefcase into the boat and then drops in the rest of the rope. If McGuire's luggage is found in his car, the police will wonder why he left it behind. Elizabeth wants it to disappear as completely as McGuire.

Willie asks, "Why do we have to get rid of the car before we get rid of the body? Isn't the body a worse clue than the car?"

"It will take more time to dump the body than it will to ditch the car. We ditch the car 1st so Paul won't see it when he comes home."

"Are you still gonna shoot him if he catches you in McGuire's car?"

"Yes, Willie."

"I'd pay real money to see that. Thanks for letting me watch for free, Miss Elizabeth."

"You're welcome, Willie. But for Carolyn's sake, I hope it does not come to that."

"He brought McGuire to Collinwood, Miss Elizabeth. Little Miss Carolyn might be safer if you do kill him."

In 1962, Willie still has a vehicle of his own, a 1949 Dodge pickup truck. Some owner before Willie had painted it in a perfectly hideous combination: the cab and wheels are yellow, and the bed is green as grass. Not exactly inconspicuous, even at night, but they can not risk Willie driving Elizabeth's yellow '57 Chevy station wagon. He has never driven it, so if anyone sees Willie driving the Chevy, they will be suspicious about it.

Elizabeth leads the way in McGuire's car and Willie follows in his truck. They do not go through Collinsport. They drive North on Collins Road, the road along the coast North of Collinsport, until it intersects U.S. 1. They turn North on U.S. 1 and drive 2 miles to a Gulf gas station that is closed at this hour. Elizabeth parks at the edge of the station and gets out.

If something goes wrong, Elizabeth must not be caught with McGuire's keys on her. The fastest way to get rid of them is to leave them in the switch. But that means risking some dumb-ass teenager stealing the car and causing a wreck that kills innocent bystanders. The 2nd fastest way to get rid of them is to open the Caddy's trunk, drop in McGuire's keys, and then close it. That is what she does.

Elizabeth gets into Willie's truck on the passenger side - just in time to see Willie take a swig from his flask. He is obviously drunker than when she awoke him.

"Shit! Willie! Have you been drinking and driving all the way out here?"

"Well shurr, Mish 'Lizbeth. You didn't think I could do somethin' like thish sober did ya?"

Elizabeth curses, then grabs Willie's arm and pulls him over to the passenger seat. The truck jerks and then stalls when Willie's foot comes off the clutch pedal. "I'm driving, Willie."

"You never drove thish old truck ... " She cuts him off by shutting the door in his face. She wants to slam the door in Willie's face, but she is careful to close it gently. The old truck has to get them back to Collinwood. She knows the truck is an inanimate object - but does the truck know it?

Willie tries again as Elizabeth gets in the driver's door. "You never drove thish old truck, Mish 'Lizbeth."

"The stick shift in this won't be as smooth as the 4-on-the-floor in the Jaguar, but I'll manage. And this is no time for you to get pulled over for drunk driving."

Elizabeth steps on the clutch with her left foot. She whispers, "Please start," as her right foot reaches for the big starter button on the floor. The old truck starts on the 1st try. She drives back to Collinwood and parks in front of the boathouse. They are soon underway to Devil's Deep.

When they reach the approximate location of Devil's Deep, Elizabeth takes bearings on Collinwood and the lighthouse with her compass. Willie has gotten them pretty close navigating by seaman's eye.

"That way, Willie," Elizabeth says as she points to their starboard bow.

Willie has no objections to taking such directions from a woman, not when the woman is Miss Elizabeth. He knows that Mr. Dan taught her to navigate, back when the Collins family still had a much bigger boat than this one.

A few minutes later Elizabeth is satisfied with their position, and she tells Willie to stop.

Elizabeth deals with the luggage 1st. She checks with the flashlight to make sure the luggage rope is clear of her ankles and Willie's. She throws the suitcase and the brief case overboard, and then passes the rope overboard until she is holding the very end of it. She is pleased to see that the holes she punched in the cases work perfectly: the water flows in and the air flows out and the cases are slowly sinking. She pulls on the rope and smiles with pleasure at how heavy the cases feel. She lets go of the rope only when the cases sink and try to pull her down with them.

"Willie, move on maybe a hundred feet. If someone's anchor snags the cases, I don't want it to snag the body too."

Willie complies. Then Elizabeth helps him get the corpse into position on top of the lobster box and the gunwale, something that Barnabas will not do when he and Willie dispose of Dr. Hoffman's "corpse" ten years later. She reaches into the open end of the enshrouding sheet and pulls out the towel that she wrapped around McGuire's head earlier. She drops it overboard. She does not want it to get in the way of the fish eating McGuire's face. She reaches overboard to wash her hands in case she got any blood on them.

"You want to say any words over 'im first, Mish 'Lizbeth?"

"Good riddance to bad rubbish."

"Amen." They push the body off the gunwale and the lobster box, and into the water.

Willie reaches for the concrete block.

"No, Willie!"

"Wha's wrong?"

"Pass all the slack in the rope overboard 1st, to make sure it's not around your ankle." She turns on the flashlight again to make sure about the rope. As before, she covers the lens with her left hand, and lets out only a thin bar of light between her 2nd and 3rd fingers. 5 years later, the position of her fingers will become associated with the Vulcan greeting "Peace and long life."

"Yes, Ma'am." Willie does as Elizabeth says, and then drops the block overboard. The block disappears instantly and the body quickly follows.

"Are you shurr you've never done thish before, Mish 'Lizbeth?"

Elizabeth laughs, really laughs, for the 1st time today. "Yes Willie. And I promise not to make a habit of it."

"If Mr. Stoddard makes a habit of bringing home bastards like McGuire, you make a habit of killing 'em, and I'll make a habit of dumping 'em. There's room enough out here for a billion of 'em."

"It's a deal, Willie. Let's go home."

As Willie turns the boat for home, Elizabeth starts counting: "One thousand one, one thousand two, ... " and so on all the way to, " ... one thousand thirty." At that point she drops the Luger overboard. She starts the count over, and drops the Beretta overboard at the 2nd " ... one thousand thirty." She repeats the count a 3rd time, and then drops the 3 boxes of ammo overboard. She picks up the switchblades and drops them overboard one at a time. She counts them to make sure she gets all 5 of them.

She shines the flashlight into the bucket to check on the magazines and the ejected rounds from the Luger and the Beretta. They are still in the bottom of the bucket. Elizabeth picks up the bucket and pours them overboard.

She counts one last time and then draws the .38 from her jacket pocket. She admits to herself that she has been looking forward to shooting Paul with it. She is reluctant to let it go. Killing Paul, if it comes to that, with the last switchblade will be a lot harder than killing him with the .38.

She swings out the cylinder and dumps the ammo into the sea, and then drops the gun itself overboard.

Elizabeth has a lot of time to think on the trip back to the boathouse, and a lot to think about. Including, "If Mr. Stoddard makes a habit of bringing home bastards like McGuire, you make a habit of killing 'em, and I'll make a habit of dumping 'em. There's room enough out here for a billion of 'em."

And, "If you ever have to defend yourself with some kind of a club, don't stop swinging it until the enemy's brains are dripping off the end of it."

They will not make a billion trips out here. Just one more, at most. If Paul brings another bastard like McGuire to Collinwood, then she will kill both of them - and she will hit Paul enough times to make sure.

After they tie up the boat, Elizabeth says, "Willie, you realize that _you_ now have something to blackmail me with."

"Bite your tongue, Mish 'Lizbeth! You are Mr. Dan's daughter and little Mish Carolyn's mother. And I know what you do to blackmailers."

"OK, Willie. But if we get caught, then you tell the police that I blackmailed _you_ into helping me. I threatened to tell people, starting with my father, that you molested Carolyn. Understand?"

"Yes, Mish 'Lizbeth."

She drives the truck back to its usual parking place right behind the house. They get out, with Elizabeth carrying the grocery bag. Willie knocks on the back door, waits, and then knocks again. They have to wait for Mrs. Johnson to reach this point on her patrol and let them in.

"Thank you, Mrs. Johnson. Did Mr. Stoddard or anyone else try to get in?"

"No, Ma'am."

"Good. Thank you for standing guard. Willie, please take the bag and go to the drawing room. Wait for me there."

Elizabeth follows Mrs. Johnson to her room to retrieve the .32. She thanks her again and then joins Willie in the drawing room.

Elizabeth pours 2 fingers of her father's best Scotch into 2 glasses, and hands one to Willie. She raises her own glass and says, "In the words of Sam Spade, 'Success to crime' ."

They click their glasses together and drink.

"Thank you, Willie."

"For what? You didn't do nothin' tonight and I didn't help you do nothin' tonight."

Elizabeth raises her glass again and says, "That's the spirit, Willie."

They click their glasses again and Willie drains his. "If it's OK with you, Mish 'Lizbeth, I'm going back to bed."

"Certainly, Willie. Good night. And thank you again - for _nothing_."

"You're welcome, Mish 'Lizbeth. Good night."

Elizabeth carries her glass, the grocery bag, and the .32 upstairs. She returns the .32 to her father's desk, and then goes to the room she shares with Paul. She opens the window a crack to be sure she hears the Jag when Paul returns. She opens it even though she knows Paul always revs up the Jag to announce his return, even at hours when he knows Carolyn should be asleep.

Elizabeth changes into her nightgown. When Paul comes home, she does not want him asking why she changed into slacks. But she knows that she will not get any sleep tonight.

She does not search the Maine Official Highway Map for any scribbled notes about Paul or the Collins family. She tears it up along the fold lines and then feeds it into the fire, one rectangle at a time. She uses the poker to beat the curled rectangles of ash into flakes.

She spreads the money out on the bed. She removes the rubber bands and discovers that each bundle is composed of every denomination from $1 to $100. She does not count the money, the exact amount might be more guilty knowledge. She sorts it by denomination, and then by age within each denomination.

Some of the newest hundreds, fifties, and twenties are brand new and have consecutive serial numbers. She will spend them last, perhaps years from now to be on the safe side. She will try to age them 1st.

She will not risk depositing any of the money in the bank. She will spend it gradually on the things she pays for in cash, like groceries and gas. And she will start paying for some car and boat repairs in cash. She puts some of the money in her purse. She puts the rest back into the rubber bands, but still sorted by denomination, and then back into the grocery bag. She puts in the last switchblade too. She hides the bag behind the secret panel in her room. Just before she married Paul, her father asked her to not share the secret panel with her husband. She is glad now that she honored her father's request.

Elizabeth puts on her robe and slippers, and carries her now empty glass back to the drawing room. She pours wine, her usual drink, into it. She gets the vacuum cleaner from the broom closet and rolls it into the drawing room. She takes off her slippers and vacuums the stone floor between the sofa and the fire place over and over again. Carolyn often plays on this floor. If Elizabeth misses any little pieces of glass, she wants her own bare feet - not any part of Carolyn's body - to find them. Then she wipes the stone floor with Windex and paper towels over and over and over, until the Windex is gone.

With the Windex gone and the paper towels burning in the fireplace, Elizabeth stands in the middle of the floor sipping her wine. She runs her bare right foot over the round metal thing in the middle of the floor. One round metal thing in a floor that is otherwise rectangular blocks of stone.

Carolyn was 4 when she asked, "Mommy, what's this funny round thing in the floor?"

"I don't know, honey. I was about your age when I asked my Daddy that same question. And my Daddy was a little boy when he asked his Daddy, and so on and so on. Maybe it's just a decoration. Or maybe Joshua Collins or his son Barnabas knew what it was for and never told Jeremiah. Or maybe Jeremiah knew but didn't tell Millicent before he went to sea and never came back. Some day you will be a mommy. And your little girl or little boy will ask you that question. Maybe by then we will know what it is."

She pours more wine into her glass and carries it back to the room she shares with Paul. She drinks and paces the room and wrestles with her conscience.

McGuire was some kind of criminal. The money is his ill gotten gains, and the guns and the rope and the tape were the tools of his criminal trade. Elizabeth shivers at the thought of how easily he could have shot her when her back was turned. He must have assumed it would be easy to take the Colt from her - and then rape and kill her in his own sweet time.

And rape and kill Carolyn too.

The guns and the money are evidence of McGuire's crimes. Maybe the suitcase and the briefcase were evidence too. Perhaps the Cadillac is evidence, maybe McGuire stole it. Maybe McGuire's body and the various wallets on it are evidence. How many crimes, besides Elizabeth's murder of McGuire, would be solved if Elizabeth had called the police instead of deep-sixing all that evidence? How many families would have at least found out what happened to their loved ones, and had the satisfaction of knowing the killer had paid for it?

"Blood is thicker than water," she tells herself. "My own family comes 1st. And that goes 10 times over for my baby." She smiles. Carolyn is 5 now, and she hates it when Mommy calls her, "My baby."

Elizabeth was willing to go to prison for killing Paul _and_ McGuire, until McGuire reminded her that Collinwood's back yard is the Atlantic Ocean. But she absolutely can not go to prison for killing just McGuire.

Maybe she could have gotten off with manslaughter for killing McGuire. Maybe the sentence would have been only 10 years. But with Elizabeth in prison, Paul would have had custody of Carolyn. How badly could Paul f*** up Carolyn in 10 years? How many more McGuires would he have brought home to meet her? And without Carolyn's mother there to kill them for her.

Elizabeth is a little drunk by now. She goes to Carolyn's door and softly opens it. Tears run down her checks as she looks at her sleeping baby, who really is asleep now.

Elizabeth thinks, "Carolyn, I know you hate it when I call you 'My baby.' But there is a part of me who will always see you as the tiny, red, crying, helpless newborn that Dr. Lang laid in my arms. My 1st sight of you was blurred by my tears, just as my sight is now. But they are not tears of joy this time.

"You will always be my baby. I love you, and I would die for you. But tonight I learned it is better to kill for you than to die for you. Because I can only die for you once, but I can kill for you as many times as I must to keep you safe.

"And that includes killing your Daddy. I know that would hurt you, and I know you would hate me for it. But if your Daddy brings home another McGuire, then I will kill both of them. I would rather have you hate me than let another McGuire or anyone else hurt you."

Elizabeth goes back to her room. She paces and cries and waits for Paul to come home. And as the hours pass far beyond the latest time he has ever been gone before, she asks herself, again and again, "Where the hell is Paul? Did I kill him after all? Did he pass out at the wheel and have a wreck? Did he hit another car and maybe kill a whole family?"

She also tells herself, "McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him. I didn't do anything tonight, and Willie did not help me do anything tonight. Therefore, McGuire is still alive and still a threat to Carolyn. I must tell Willie that tomorrow. We must act like McGuire is still alive and we are afraid of him."

And she prays. Please, God, keep Carolyn safe. Please bring Paul safely home. And if he ever brings another McGuire home with him, please give me the courage and the strength to kill both of them."

Again and again she looks out the window. "What do I want to see most?" she asks herself. "Paul's Jag, or a police car bringing me the news that Paul is dead?"

* * *

><p>Carolyn always hears Daddy's car and wakes up when Daddy comes home, no matter how late he comes home.<p>

On her 5th birthday, Carolyn promised herself she would never again climb into bed with Mommy and Daddy on those mornings when she wakes up before they do and it is still dark outside, no matter how scared and lonely she feels. Climbing into Mommy and Daddy's bed is for babies.

Carolyn wakes up while it is still dark on the morning after Daddy brought Mr. McGuire to Collinwood. She instantly notices it is still dark. A few moments later she realizes that she did not hear Daddy's car.

She gets out of bed and runs to the window. Daddy's car is not in the driveway.

Carolyn feels tears welling up in her eyes. She goes out the door and down the hall towards Mommy and Daddy's room. Climbing into Mommy and Daddy's bed is for babies, but Daddy didn't come home!

She stops when she sees the door of Mommy and Daddy's room is open a crack and the light inside is on. The door is supposed to be closed and the light is supposed to be off this early in the morning.

She pushes the door open a little more and sees Mommy pacing the room in her nightgown. She is walking away when Carolyn opens the door. When Mommy turns to walk the other way, she sees Carolyn at the door.

"Carolyn."

Carolyn runs to Mommy crying, "Mommy! Daddy didn't come home! Daddy didn't come home!"

Mommy drops to her knees to hug Carolyn. "I know, honey, I know."

Mother and daughter hold each other tight and cry together. But part of Mommy's mind is saying, "Damn you, Paul Stoddard. Where the hell are you?"


	3. Chapter 3 Morning

**_Dark Shadows: _****_Elizabeth_****_'s Secret: _****Part 3 "Morning" **

**This is a prequel to Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows, _including the deleted scenes that are included on the Blu-Ray Disc. It is also a prequel to my fanfiction _Dark Shadows 2_, which I am still working on. **

**I do not own _Dark Shadows_ or any of its characters, institutions, or entities. **

"You know, honey ... everyone in this house has at least one big, scary secret.  
>Yours can't be all that bad." - Dr. Julia Hoffman to Victoria Winters at the end of Scene 108, the last deleted scene on the Blu-Ray Disc of <em>Dark Shadows<em>

"Mommy, where's Daddy?  
>He's been gone for so long.<br>Is he ever coming home?" - Carolyn Stoddard introducing "The Ballad of Dwight Fry" at the Collinwood Happening

October 1962  
>Morning comes to the great house of Collinwood - the morning after the disappearance of Paul Stoddard and the death of the uninvited, and unlamented, Jason McGuire.<p>

Elizabeth Collins Stoddard lies wide awake on her bed. The only part of her that has slept this night is her left arm, around her daughter.

Carolyn cried herself to sleep on her mother's breast. Elizabeth is determined not to move until Carolyn wakes up, no matter how much her arm hurts. But now it is the time Elizabeth usually gets up, and her bladder is determined to keep her on schedule.

"I can stand it a little longer," she tells herself. And she does stand it a little longer. And a little longer after that, and a little longer after that. But then she wakes Carolyn up, as gently as she can.

"Mommy?" Carolyn wakes up confused, why is she in bed with Mommy? "DADDY!" She looks around, frantic to find her Daddy.

"No, Carolyn, he never came home last night. I'm sorry."

Carolyn starts to cry again.

"Let's get up, Carolyn. We'll have breakfast, and then ... then I'll go to the Sheriff and ask him to look for Daddy."

"I don't want any breakfast! I just want my Daddy!"

"When Daddy comes home, don't you want to be strong enough to run to him and welcome him home?"

It is difficult for Elizabeth to make a convincing argument for breakfast when she has no appetite herself. They compromise on orange juice. Elizabeth has toast and coffee too. She needs the coffee to stay alert through what promises to be a rough day, and she needs the toast because coffee with no food upsets her stomach.

Carolyn drinks her orange juice and then says, "I'm going to the tower to look for Daddy."

"All right, Carolyn. But be careful on the stairs. Walk, don't run."

"Yes, Mommy."

When Carolyn is gone, Elizabeth puts her head in her hands and tells herself, "I will not cry. I will not cry anymore, not for that worthless son of a bitch, even though he is Carolyn's Daddy."

She is vaguely aware of the sound of doors closing. She is almost asleep, leaning into her hands, when she hears, "Miss Elizabeth?"

Startled, she looks up at Willie, who is standing close by. She sees that both of the doors to the hall are closed.

"Yes, Willie?"

"Seeing little Miss Carolyn like that, I'm glad that you didn't ... you know ... that you didn't ..."

"Yes, Willie, I know. I'm glad too. And thank you for being so careful about not saying out loud what it was that I didn't do, not even saying it behind closed doors. Please keep it up."

"Yes, Ma'am."

"Willie, last night, you said that I didn't do anything and you didn't help me do anything. If I didn't do anything, then McGuire is still alive and he is still a threat to Carolyn. We must act like McGuire is still alive and we are still afraid of him.

"Carolyn is so upset, I doubt that she will want to go out and play today. But if she does, then one of us must go with her and keep our eyes peeled for McGuire. If we see him or his car, then we pick up Carolyn and run like hell for the house. _Understand?_"

Willie is silent for a few seconds, getting what Miss Elizabeth has said straight in his head. Then he says, "Whatever you say, Miss Elizabeth."

"If Paul isn't home by 8 o'clock, I'm going to the Sheriff's office to report him missing. And when I leave, you bolt the door behind me."

"Yes, Miss Elizabeth."

At 8AM, Elizabeth gets into her yellow '57 Chevy station wagon and drives to the Sheriff's office in town. The piece of paper with McGuire's license number on it is in her purse.

In the privacy of Sheriff Bill Malloy's office, Elizabeth tells him a mixture of truth and lies. She says Paul left during a quarrel, as he has done so many times before. But this time he left a guest behind, a guest that Carolyn is afraid of, a rude and stubborn guest who left only after putting up an argument about it.

And this time Paul did not come home. This is the 1st time he has ever been gone all night after a quarrel. Elizabeth is afraid McGuire may have hurt Paul. She hands Malloy the paper with McGuire's license number on it. She says she wrote it down because Carolyn is afraid of McGuire, and she wanted a record of his license number if anything happened to Carolyn ... and now maybe something has happened to Paul.

Malloy says, "Liz, I'm not supposed to take a missing person report until he has been missing for at least 24 hours. Too many people come back by that time. But Mr. Stoddard has the only Jaguar roadster in the county, so keeping an eye out for it isn't any trouble. And Angie has the only red Cadillac convertible in the county, so looking for a red Caddy convertible with a Massachusetts license number is no problem either."

"I think McGuire's car is newer than Angelique's. His fins were less outrageous than hers."

"Angie's is a '59, the most outrageous fins ever."

"Certainly the most outrageous I've ever seen. Thank you, Bill."

They shake hands and Elizabeth leaves.

Malloy orders the radio operator to send out a BOLO (Be On the Look-Out) for Paul's car and McGuire's car. Malloy's desk sergeant is also his teletype operator. Malloy orders him to send a teletype to the Massachusetts State Police, asking if there are any wants or warrants out on a red Cadillac convertible, Massachusetts license number DNS970.

Elizabeth does not go straight home when she is finished at the Sheriff's office.

She tells herself, again, "McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him. Therefore, I must act like I am afraid of him."

Elizabeth goes to Scott's Hardware, which is next door to Parker's Market, her favorite grocery store in Collinsport. Like most small town hardware stores in Maine, Scott's Hardware sells guns. Most of the guns are rifles and shotguns, suitable for hunting. But they also have a display case full of pistols.

Elizabeth looks carefully at all the pistols, but then points to the one that caught her eye the 1st moment she looked into the case.

"Is that revolver hammerless?"

"No, Ma'am," Mr. Scott replies. "The hammer is completely enclosed, which means you can't cock it manually. It's enclosed so it won't snag on the lining of your purse or coat pocket. Of course, it's not legal to carry it like that without a permit.

"It's a Smith and Wesson Model 42 Centennial Airweight. Airweight means the frame is aluminum alloy, so the gun is nearly 1/3 lighter than the steel version. That makes it easier to carry, but it kicks a little harder."

"What caliber is it?"

".38 Special, same as the longer Smith and Wessons the sheriff and his deputies carry."

Mr. Scott wonders why Elizabeth smiles at the fact that the gun is a .38.

"May I look at it?"

"Certainly, Ma'am." Mr. Scott opens the door in the back of the case and picks up the gun. He swings out the cylinder to make sure the gun is not loaded. He hands it to Elizabeth, with the cylinder still out so she can see it is not loaded - if she knows about such things.

Elizabeth knows. She looks at the back of the cylinder and says, "Five shots." She smiles again.

Mr. Scott wonders why Elizabeth smiles at the fact that the gun holds 5 shots.

It amuses Elizabeth to spend McGuire's money on a 5 shot, Smith and Wesson snub-nosed .38 (but a different model from McGuire's) - which she is buying "to use on McGuire if he ever comes back to Collinwood."

"McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him."

Elizabeth also knows that you do not swing the cylinder of a revolver in and out with a flick of the wrist, not if you want the gun to last. After examining the gun for a few seconds, she gently pushes the cylinder shut and points the gun at the floor.

"Mr. Scott, I am not going to dry-fire this gun. But with your permission, I would like to pull the trigger part way to get some idea of how stiff the trigger pull is."

Mr. Scott smiles. He is impressed by Elizabeth's know-how. He says, "Go right ahead, Mrs. Stoddard. But you'll have to get a firm grip on it. That thing on the back strap is a grip safety. You can't squeeze the trigger unless the grip safety is pushed in."

"Thank you." Elizabeth slowly squeezes the trigger. Since she cannot see the hammer, she watches the cylinder turn. When it has turned almost one notch, she relaxes the pressure on the trigger.

When Elizabeth's father taught her to shoot the old Colt, he told her that Colt and Smith and Wesson were the 2 biggest revolver makers in the world, but they did things bass-ackwards from each other. The cylinder of a Colt turns clockwise (from the shooter's point of view) and the cylinder of a Smith and Wesson turns anti-clockwise. To swing out the cylinder of a Colt, you pull the cylinder latch to the rear. On a Smith and Wesson, you push the cylinder latch forward.

McGuire's .38 was the 1st Smith and Wesson Elizabeth had ever handled, and she had fumbled with the cylinder latch until she remembered her father's words. Now she deliberately fumbles with the Model 42 for a moment to give Mr. Scott the idea she has never handled a Smith and Wesson before. Then she gently pushes the cylinder out and hands the gun back to Mr. Scott.

"I'll take it. And a cleaning kit and 4 boxes of ammunition, please. Flat nosed bullets please, but not pure lead ones. I don't want to scrub lead fouling out of the bore."

Elizabeth is impressing Mr. Scott more every minute.

"How about jacketed soft points, Mrs. Stoddard?" He pulls a box of Remington cartidges from a cabinet and removes one cartridge from it. "Jacketed at the base where it touches the bore of the gun. But a pure, soft lead flat nose in front."

"Perfect. I will also need some man-shaped targets, and a 2 foot by 4 foot piece of plywood to mount them on. And some thumb tacks. I still have the shooting glasses and ear-muff type hearing protectors that I used when I used to shoot skeet. Do you have a pair small enough for a 5 year old? Carolyn might want to watch me shoot."

"I do have a small pair of ear-muffs. But plywood won't stop bullets, Ma'am. You'll need a proper backstop behind the plywood to stop the bullets."

"I know just the thing."

* * *

><p>Deputy Sheriff Jack Seward is northbound on U.S. 1 north of Collinsport when he hears the order to be on the lookout for Paul Stoddard's green Jaguar roadster and Jason McGuire's red Cadillac convertible. He turns around and goes back to the Gulf station to check the red Caddy convertible he saw when he passed the station a few minutes ago.<p>

The Massachusetts plate on the Caddy's tail matches the one in the BOLO. Seward calls it in, then gets out to talk to the station's owner.

The owner says the car was here when he arrived at 7AM, and he has no idea who it belongs to, and if it is still here tomorrow morning he will tow it to the Sheriff's impound yard.

Seward calls in these additions to his report and then resumes his patrol. 5 minutes later his radio crackles again. "Return to Gulf station, Code 3. Cadillac is stolen. Secure vehicle and wait for fingerprint man."

Seward switches on the red light on the roof, makes a U-turn, and heads back to the Gulf station with his siren wailing. ("Code 3" = siren and red light, and floor it)

* * *

><p>When Elizabeth returns to Collinwood with her new .38, Willie tells her that the Sheriff called and wants her to call him back as soon as she returns.<p>

She makes the call and the Sheriff tells her that McGuire's car is stolen. If McGuire returns to Collinwood, do not let him in under any circumstances, and call the Sheriff immediately. She promises to do so.

Elizabeth tells herself, "McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him. If he returns to Collinwood, I will kill him on sight."

Elizabeth goes to the tower room and tells Carolyn she bought a gun to use on McGuire if he ever returns to Collinwood. "Do you want to come watch me shoot it?"

Carolyn looks at the gun, in its box at the moment, and smiles for the 1st time since she smiled at her Daddy's return yesterday. But she says, "No, Mommy. I want to stay here and look for Daddy."

"OK, honey." Elizabeth kisses her and then goes out to practice with her new gun.

When automobiles replaced carriages, Collinwood's carriage house became its garage. But as the family's fortunes declined, replacing the roof of the garage was repeatedly postponed, because the money was needed elsewhere - to replace the roof of the manor itself, for one thing. The water leaking through the old roof caused the timbers below to rot. One day the roof collapsed under the weight of Collinsport's heaviest snow in 20 years. Fortunately, the family cars of the time were not inside.

Elizabeth's grandfather had declared, "The peasants have always had to scrape snow and ice off their cars. Now we must do so too."

Elizabeth parks the Chevy in front of the ruins of the garage and uses the tailgate as a shelf to hold her ammo and targets. She props the plywood against the wall of the garage. This wall plus the far wall plus the debris between them should be more than enough to stop the bullets.

She tacks a target to the plywood, and takes 7 paces away from it. She figures that is about 20 feet. She loads her new .38 and opens fire.

She starts with the chest. When she can consistently put 5 shots in the center of the chest in less than 5 seconds, she switches to head shots. She takes her time with those, but soon she can put 5 shots in the head in less than 10 seconds. After that, she works on combinations: 4 in the chest plus one in the head, then 3 in the chest plus 2 in the head, and back again.

When she is satisfied with her marksmanship with her new gun, she polices up her brass. She vows to practice at least once a week, at least 50 rounds per practice.

Elizabeth cleans the .38 in the tool room of the boathouse. It is almost lunch time when she returns to the manor after cleaning the gun. Willie, who is visibly nervous, unbolts the door to let her in - and then tells her the Sheriff has called again.

Elizabeth whispers, "Relax, Willie. If the Sheriff knew anything, he would be here in person to arrest me."

She calls Sheriff Bill Malloy again. He tells her to consider McGuire armed and dangerous.

"Thank you, Bill. But I figured he was dangerous when I saw that Carolyn was afraid of him. I bought a snub-nosed .38 today. I would like to see you this afternoon to apply for a permit to carry it."

"Sure, Liz. Any time."

After Elizabeth hangs up, she tells herself, again, "McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him."

And she asks, as she has asked so many times since last night, "Where the hell is Paul?"

**Notes  
><strong>A. Scott's Hardware and Parker's Market are named for Kathryn Leigh Scott and Lara Parker, respectively. In the original _Dark Shadows_, Ms. Scott played Maggie Evans and Josette, and Ms. Parker played Angelique. Both of them played guests at the Collinwood Happening in Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows_.

B. I borrowed the term "Code 3" from the TV series _Adam 12_ (1968-1975). There is also a manufacturer of sirens and light bars with the name Code 3.

One of the black and white Collinsport police cars in Burton's _Shadows_ is a 1968 Plymouth Belvedere. Except for its door markings, this car looks like Burton & Co. stole it straight off the set of _Adam 12_.

The best shot of this car in the finished film is when it stops behind Angie's red Barracuda convertible in front of Collinwood. It and the other black and white (a 1970 Plymouth Belvedere, same as the blue Collinsport police cars in _House of Dark Shadows_) are shown better in 2 of the bonus features on the Blu-Ray Disc:  
>1. the Focus Point "Welcome to Collinsport."<br>2. Deleted Scene number 95 - "Police Warn Willie and Barnabas."


	4. Chapter 4 The Ford Motor Co Presents

**_Dark Shadows: _****_Elizabeth_****_'s Secret: _****Part 4 "The Ford Motor Company presents ... "**

**This is a prequel to Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows, _including the deleted scenes that are included on the Blu-Ray Disc. It is also a prequel to my fanfiction _Dark Shadows 2_, which I am still working on. **

**The name in parenthesis following the 1st mention of a character is the actor who would play that character in a movie version of this story. (I can dream, can't I?) **

**I do not own _Dark Shadows_ or _The FBI_ or any of their respective characters, institutions, or entities. **

"You know, honey ... everyone in this house has at least one big, scary secret.  
>Yours can't be all that bad." - Dr. Julia Hoffman to Victoria Winters at the end of Scene 108, the last deleted scene on the Blu-Ray Disc of <em>Dark Shadows<em>

"Mommy, where's Daddy?  
>He's been gone for so long.<br>Is he ever coming home?" - Carolyn Stoddard introducing "The Ballad of Dwight Fry" at the Collinwood Happening

October 1962  
>In the movie version of this story, we would see waves crashing against black rocks. Then the water drains off the rocks toward the camera. A wave breaks over the camera from behind, and the water pours down in front of the lens. The camera moves along the bottom until it comes to a corpse wrapped in a sheet. The corpse is completely covered, including the head. It floats upright at the end of the rope that connects it to a concrete block resting on the ocean floor. Fish swim in and out of the open end of the enshrouding sheet, above the corpse's head. Some of the outbound fish have threads of flesh trailing from their jaws.<p>

The picture freezes at this point. The opening theme from the TV series _The FBI_ (1965-1974)plays as words appear on the screen:

File #7-62766-MX  
>Jason McGuire<br>Kidnapping  
>Unlawful Flight to Avoid Prosecution<br>Interstate Transportation of a Stolen Motor Vehicle

_The FBI _music continues as 2 Ford 4-door sedans roll up the driveway and stop in front of Collinwood. The 1st Ford is a white 1960 model. It is marked "SHERIFF" and there is a single red Beacon Ray light on the roof. The 2nd Ford is a blue 1961 model. It is unmarked and there is no light on the roof, but it has a long antenna on the left rear fender, just like the Sheriff's car. It carries U.S. Government license plates.

As Sheriff Bill Malloy gets out of the '60 Ford, a tall, distinguished looking man (George Clooney) gets out of the '61 Ford. He is in his forties, but his black hair has only a few strands of gray in it. He does not button the coat of his gray suit after he gets out of the car. The music trails off as he and the Sheriff walk toward the front door of Collinwood.

It is the afternoon of the day after Paul Stoddard disappeared and the unlamented Jason McGuire died in the drawing room of the great house of Collinwood - the afternoon following the morning that Elizabeth reported Paul missing and bought a gun to use on McGuire "if he ever returns to Collinwood."

Inside Collinwood, Elizabeth is sitting on the sofa that faces the fireplace in the grand foyer. She is trying to read, but can not concentrate. She hears Carolyn almost running down the stairs and calling, "Mommy! Mommy!"

"What is it, Carolyn?"

"The Sheriff is coming. And there's another car with him. Maybe he found Daddy!" She runs toward the front door.

"Carolyn! Wait!" Elizabeth runs after Carolyn. She knows Carolyn, in her excitement, is running to open the front door before Bill Malloy even knocks on it. "A bad man like Mr. McGuire might steal a Sheriff's car to fool us. Let's look out the window and check before we open the door."

Elizabeth holds Carolyn's hand as they both look out the window next to the front door. "OK, Carolyn. It's the Sheriff and a stranger, but not Mr. McGuire." She unbolts and unlocks the door. "Don't run," she says as she opens the door and lets Carolyn go out ahead of her.

Elizabeth tells herself, "McGuire is alive and I am afraid of him. Remember, McGuire is ALIVE."

"Sheriff, did you find my Daddy?"

"No, Miss Carolyn. Not yet."

Carolyn goes back to Mommy and clutches Mommy's dress. She is not crying, but she is close to it.

"Liz, this is Special Agent Lewis Erskine of the FBI." As the Sheriff speaks, Erskine shows his identification to Elizabeth. The Sheriff continues, "Mr. Erskine is the Special Agent in Charge of the Boston Field Office. Mr. Erskine, Mrs. Elizabeth Collins Stoddard, and her daughter Carolyn."

The FBI. That explains why Erskine did not button his coat: there is a .38 on his right hip. If he needs it in a hurry, he does not want a buttoned coat to be in his way.

Elizabeth's heart is pounding and her mind is racing. What the hell is the FBI doing here? She tells herself, again, "McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him."

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Stoddard. Hello, Carolyn," says Erskine.

"Mommy, what's the FBI?"

"The Federal Bureau of Investigation. It means that Mr. Erskine is a kind of policeman, but he works for Uncle Sam, instead of for Collins County like the Sheriff does. Do you remember who Uncle Sam is?"

"He's a sym ... sym ... "

"Symbol."

"Yes. He's a symbol of the United States of America." Carolyn turns to Erskine. "Mr. ... Ers ... kine, did you find my Daddy?"

"No, Carolyn. I'm sorry,"

"Then why are you here?!" Carolyn screams this question, she is angry now.

"Carolyn!"

"It's all right, Mrs. Stoddard. Carolyn, I'm here to talk to your Mommy. Maybe she can tell us something that will help us find your Daddy."

"She already talked to the Sheriff."

"Yes, but now there are some more questions we have to ask. And ... well, some of them are grownup questions that I can't ask in front of you."

"I want my Daddy! I WANT MY DADDY!" Carolyn turns and buries her face in Mommy's dress. She is now crying bitterly.

By now, Willie has joined the group at the door.

Elizabeth asks, "Willie, can you watch Carolyn while I talk to these gentlemen?"

"I want to go back to the tower," Carolyn cries. "I want to look for Daddy."

"All right, Carolyn. Be careful going up all those stairs. Walk, don't run. Willie, please go with her."

Carolyn walks quickly, still crying, toward the grand staircase. Willie watches her with a sad look on his face, and then follows her. Later, it occurs to him that Miss Elizabeth has neatly gotten him out of the sight of the cops. He hopes that also puts him out of their minds. So does Elizabeth.

"Gentlemen, let me show you to the drawing room."

In the drawing room, Elizabeth says, " Gentlemen, I know better than to offer drinks to law enforcement officers who are on duty, but would either of you like a cup of coffee or tea?"

Both men decline.

"Then let's get down to business," Elizabeth says as she sits down in the center of the sofa facing the fireplace. McGuire's last seat is to her right.

McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him.

Sheriff Malloy knows and trusts the Collins family, except for Roger, who is out of town on his honeymoon. Malloy takes the armchair to Elizabeth's right, putting his back to the door. This leaves the armchair to Elizabeth's left, where Elizabeth herself often sits with her macrame, to Erskine, who does not know Elizabeth. From that chair, he can keep his eyes on both Elizabeth and the door. He admires how neatly they have maneuvered him into this chair. He wonders if the Sheriff disregarded his request to keep "The FBI is coming" to himself. And Erskine does not sit down yet.

Elizabeth begins with, "Mr. Erskine, I know that driving a stolen car across a state line is a federal crime. McGuire's Cadillac had a Massachusetts license plate on it, and Sheriff Malloy told me that the car was stolen. If McGuire stole the car in Massachusetts and drove it to Collinsport, then he crossed 2 state lines along the way. But I can't believe an FBI man would come all the way from Boston for one lousy stolen car, no matter how many state lines the thief crossed, and even if the thief is armed and dangerous. And that goes double for the Special Agent in Charge of the Boston Field Office. So why are you here?"

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Stoddard, but I need the answers to my questions before I can answer any of yours." From an inside pocket of his jacket, Erskine draws a 3 by 5 copy of a composite sketch and shows it to Elizabeth. "Mrs. Stoddard, do you recognize this man?"

Elizabeth studies the picture for a while and then says, "It could be McGuire. McGuire is a little older, and his hair is blonde, not black like this man's. And McGuire does not have a beard or wear glasses. Except for all that, this could be McGuire."

Still standing, Erskine puts the drawing away and draws a stack of small photographs from his outside pocket. "Please tell me if you recognize any of these men." He shuffles through the stack slowly, showing Elizabeth one photo at a time.

These do not look like Elizabeth's idea of mug shots. They look more like college yearbook photos. At the 3rd one she says, "Stop! That man is not McGuire, but I've seen him somewhere before."

Erskine looks at the back of the photo for a moment and then resumes shuffling. "Anyone else, Mrs. Stoddard?"

At the 12th photo, Elizabeth says, "Stop! That's McGuire. A bit younger than he is now, but that is McGuire."

Erskine looks at the back of the photo for a moment and then resumes shuffling. "Anyone else?"

At the 20th and last photo, Elizabeth says, "That's Paul! And the 1st one I recognized was one of his college classmates. Those are college yearbook photos, not mug shots!"

"Yes Ma'am. But not all from your husband's class or even from his college." Erskine finally sits down. "Mrs. Stoddard, please tell me everything you know about Jason McGuire."

"There's not much to tell. He and Paul and Charity Trask went to college together. Paul and I quarreled yesterday afternoon. Paul stormed out, as he has so often before. He ran into McGuire at the Blue Whale. McGuire came to Collinsport because he was curious about the little fishing village that Charity talked about so much. That's the same reason Paul 1st came here. Paul invited McGuire home with him for dinner and to spend the night. He and McGuire spent dinner trading old college stories. And they drank more than they ate.

"But the most important thing I know about McGuire is that my daughter is afraid of him. She was afraid of him almost from the 1st moment she saw him. Carolyn is not afraid of the dark, or thunder, or any of the things most children are afraid of. And until yesterday, Angelique Bouchard and the Grimes Twins were the only people she was afraid of. But she is afraid of McGuire.

"That's why I told McGuire he could not spend the night here. That's why Paul and I quarreled when he put his friendship with McGuire ahead of his daughter's fear - HIS DAUGHTER'S FEAR! Paul stormed out ... again. But this time he left an unwelcome guest behind ... and left me and our daughter alone with a man our daughter fears. A rude and stubborn man who refused to leave when I first told him to leave. It took some arguing to make him go.

"And Paul did not come home last night. It's the 1st time he has ever stayed gone all night after a quarrel."

"Mrs. Stoddard, please tell me in _detail_ about your confrontation with McGuire after your husband left. How did you get him to leave?" Erskine is clearly more interested in this question than any of his previous ones.

Elizabeth stares at Erskine in silence for long seconds. She asks herself again, "What the hell is the FBI doing here?"

"Mrs. Stoddard?"

"You've got me, Mr. Erskine. I lied to you." She turns to Sheriff Malloy. "And Bill, I lied to you this morning. I'm sorry."

Now Elizabeth tells them the truth, up to a point.

"McGuire is alive. McGuire is ALIVE, and I am afraid of him."

She tells them about Paul making one crack too many about her parents. She tells them about hitting Paul with the poker and thinking she killed him. She tells them how she fled from the drawing room with McGuire's laughter in her ears.

She tells them how she decided to kill McGuire to make sure he could not hurt Carolyn while Elizabeth was in prison for killing Paul.

"When I reentered this room with my Dad's revolver, I saw that Paul's body was gone. I pointed the gun at McGuire's face with the intention of asking him where the body was, and then killing him. But before I could ask, McGuire said something like, 'Don't shoot! Don't shoot! Jesus! Paul was right! Go back to the Blue Whale where a man can drink in peace.' I don't know if those were his exact words. I was too busy being relieved that Paul was alive to pay much attention to anything else McGuire said.

"I started shaking with relief. I let the gun droop for a moment, and then I saw McGuire gathering himself to get up. I pointed the gun at his face again and told him to get out of my house and never come back.

"I followed him, at a safe distance, all the way to his car, with the gun aimed at his back. When he got in his car, he took the time to put the top up before he drove away. I don't know why he did that. Maybe it was his way of telling himself that he wasn't really afraid of me. I don't know. That was the last I saw of him and I hope I never see him again."

Elizabeth turns to Sheriff Malloy and says, "Bill, are you going to arrest me for assault with a deadly weapon or something?"

"No, Liz. Mr. Erskine, I think it's time you told her about McGuire."

"Yes, it is. But one more question 1st. Mrs. Stoddard, how long did your husband and McGuire go to college together?"

This one surprises Elizabeth. She has to think about it for a few seconds. "Now that you ask, I don't know. I just assumed it was 4 years straight through, from freshman to graduation."

"Mrs. Stoddard, McGuire was expelled one month before the end of his freshman year. He struck a coed in the mouth in the dining hall, in front of literally a hundred witnesses, maybe more."

"My God!"

"He had persistently asked the girl for a date and she had persistently said 'No.' That day in the dining hall, he asked again, and she said 'No' again. McGuire called her a filthy name, told her nobody could say no to him, and hit her."

Elizabeth's voice is ice cold. "How could Paul bring such a man home with him? Paul must have known about this, and he still invited McGuire to stay the night in this house ... the home of Paul's wife and daughter.

"But there's more, isn't there? Something much more terrible than what you have told me so far. There must be, or the Special Agent in Charge of the Boston Field Office would not be here."

"Jason McGuire was expelled the next day. The girl wanted to press criminal charges against him. The dean pressured her not to. So did her friends, especially her sorority sisters. She gave in, but she was mad enough about it that she transferred to another college for the rest of her education.

"McGuire went back to his father's house in Chicago. Mr. McGuire had used money and influence to get his son out of trouble before, but this was the last straw. He did not lift a finger to help his son.

"Two months later, Mr. McGuire died of a heart attack at the age of only 43. His brothers and their children are divided about the cause of the heart attack. Some think he died of a broken heart because of Jason's behavior. Some think Jason somehow deliberately caused the heart attack. But they all agree that Jason was more upset by the meagerness of the estate than by his father's death.

"Mr. McGuire made most of his money in the stock market. He was good at it, until the last 2 years of his life. He lost his touch, maybe because of the stress of his son's behavior. He had to re-mortgage his house and borrow heavily against his life insurance.

"Even worse, from Jason's point of view, the inheritance was in trust until he was 21, with his paternal grandfather as trustee. The grandfather was just as fed up with Jason as the father had been. He told McGuire he would supply him with room and board and a modest allowance. If he wanted more than that, he would have to get a job.

"The only job McGuire held for any length of time was doing yard work, slowly, for a rich fifty year old widow who lived on the same block as his grandparents. And when I say slowly, I mean it took him a week to mow her lawn. At some point one of them seduced the other. McGuire's grandparents and the widow's grown daughter were furious about it, but both of them were above the age of consent so there was no legal recourse.

"When McGuire turned 21, he took possession of his inheritance, bought a car and left town. His grandparents and other relatives were surprised that he bought a used Pontiac 4-door sedan instead of a new Cadillac or a fancy sports car.

"He was gone for a month. Then the widow called her daughter and told her McGuire was back and that an investment he had recommended had paid off. She asked her daughter to come to her house and see the results. The daughter was suspicious enough about it that she brought her husband with her. They left their 2 small children with a neighbor who had often watched them before.

"That night, the widow's house burned. The remains of the widow and her daughter and son-in-law were found in the ashes. The son-in-law had been shot in the head.

"The widow and her daughter died in the fire. They were brutally tortured first. An audit of the widow's bank account showed cash withdrawals totaling over $50,000 during the 2 years of her affair with McGuire.

"The grandparents' house also burned that night. Their remains were also found in the ashes, brutally tortured and then killed by the fire.

"McGuire's car was found abandoned at O'Hare Airport. A car that that was stolen in downtown Chicago that night was later found abandoned at the Gary, Indiana airport. An anonymous phone call lead the police to that car. The body of a teenage girl was in the trunk. She had been raped and murdered."

Elizabeth says slowly, "The trunk of a stolen car? Charity ... Charity Trask's body ... "

"Charity Trask had also persistently said 'No' to McGuire. She disappeared on the 1st anniversary of the fires. Her body was found in the trunk of a stolen car 6 days later. A car abandoned at the airport, and reported to the police by an anonymous phone call."

"Oh my God! That's the 'buddy' Paul brought into this house? Into HIS DAUGHTER'S HOUSE!"

"It gets worse."

"Worse?!"

"The last people to see Charity alive were a young professor and his wife. They always took a walk that time of day with their 2-month old son in a baby carriage."

Erskine pulls out the composite sketch again. "This sketch was made from their description of a man they saw with Charity the day she disappeared.

"The young professor and his family were murdered 6 months to the day after Charity Trask disappeared. Around midnight, the killer cut the phone line, broke in, shot the professor and his wife, and then set the house on fire. He left the baby to die in the fire."

Elizabeth runs out the glass doors to the terrace. She bends over the waist high stone rail at the far edge of the terrace and vomits onto the grass below. When she turns back toward the door, she sees the 2 lawmen just inside, ready to offer their help.

Elizabeth says, "Gentlemen, please excuse me for a minute." She goes to the nearest bathroom, the same one she used after vomiting on McGuire's chest. She rinses her mouth and then drinks and drinks.

She has been praying for forgiveness ever since she killed McGuire. Now she whispers, "Dear Lord, thank you for giving me the strength and the _wisdom_ to kill McGuire."

She returns to the drawing room and says, "I apologize for the interruption. Please sit down gentlemen." The men do not sit until Elizabeth has returned to her seat on the sofa.

Elizabeth asks Erskine, "The ... the girl McGuire struck in the dining hall ... did he come back for her too?"

"The girl married her college sweetheart right after graduation. They disappeared on their honeymoon. A week later their bodies were found under a tarp in the back of a stolen station wagon, abandoned at an airport, and reported by an anonymous phone call."

"My God. How many more?"

"I can't tell you, Mrs. Stoddard, partly because we don't know for sure. And this is an ongoing investigation, so normally I wouldn't tell a witness as much as I have already told you. I've told you all this in the hope it will make you take the advice I'm about to offer."

"Advice?"

"Mrs. Stoddard, you confronted McGuire with a gun in your hand and murder in your heart. That is the only reason you and your daughter and your servants are alive today. If McGuire ever comes back here, don't let him in under any circumstances. If he has Carolyn in his hands when he arrives at your door, then you must consider Carolyn as already dead! If you let McGuire in, he will kill you too, and everyone else in the house. Bolt the doors, grab your gun, and then call the Sheriff. And don't be surprised if the phone line is cut."

"What about Paul?"

"I don't know, Mrs. Stoddard. If McGuire found him at the Blue Whale, he probably killed him. At my request, every police department in the Northeast is looking for your husband's Jaguar. I'm sorry to say that includes checking airport parking lots."

Elizabeth says nothing.

"But there is another possibility."

"What's that?"

"Mrs. Stoddard, did McGuire have enough time to kill your husband and hide the body before you came back with the gun?"

"Maybe. But he couldn't have taken it very far. And what about Paul's car? It's a Jaguar roadster, not a Jeep. He could not have driven it into the woods. In fact, the undergrowth in the woods of Collinwood is so thick, I don't think even a Jeep could get very far."

"May Sheriff Malloy and I take a look around the house and the grounds?"

"Certainly. Allow me to be show you around."

She leads them around the house and then the grounds, except for her own room and Carolyn's room, and the tower room. She tells them she has been in those rooms often enough since last night that she is sure there is no body in them. She also does not reveal any of the secret rooms to them. She will check those herself later - and how could McGuire have found any of them?

While the lawmen search the unoccupied bedrooms on the 2nd floor, Elizabeth excuses herself long enough to put on her boatshoes. When they are finished searching the house, she leads them around the grounds - including the boathouse. She leads them all the way down there after expressing her doubts that McGuire could have gone to the boathouse and back to the drawing room in the time she was gone. Even if he drove Paul's body down there in Paul's car, could he have walked back up that hill in time? And Paul's car is no where within sight of the boathouse.

They return to the house through the kitchen, where Elizabeth offers the lawmen water. After their long walk, especially up the hill from the boathouse, they gratefully accept the offer.

After they resume their seats in the drawing room, Erskine asks, "Mrs. Stoddard, your daughter has good instincts. She was right to be afraid of McGuire. Do you know why she was afraid of him?"

"No. I haven't asked her. As I told you before, she is also afraid of Angelique Bouchard and the Grimes Twins. She cried every time I asked her why she was afraid of them. So I didn't ask why she was afraid of McGuire."

"May I ask her? It might help us find your husband and McGuire."

"How will it help?"

"I don't know. As I said, it _might_ help. We won't know until we try."

"I don't like this. But I will ask her to speak to you."

As Elizabeth rises, the 2 lawmen rise too.

After Elizabeth leaves, Erskine asks Malloy, "Who are Angelique Bouchard and the Grimes Twins?"

"Angie is President of the Angel Bay Seafood Company, same as her mother before her and her grandmother before that, and so on for 6 generations. We drove past Angel Bay on the way to Collinwood."

"Yes, I remember. It looked like the biggest business in town."

"Yes, it is. The Grimes Twins are the identical twin daughters of Mordecai and Lavinia Grimes. Very pretty girls, but there is something ... odd about how they look. Odd and revolting. I know that makes no sense after saying they are very pretty, but that's how they look. If you see a blue and white '58 Chevy 4-door hardtop during your stay, that's their car. Mr. Grimes bought it new for them right after they got their drivers licenses."

"What do the twins themselves look like?"

"Twenty years old, 5 foot 6, long black hair, black eyes, and the whitest skin I have ever seen. Or maybe it just seems so super white because of their clothes and hair. They always wear black, even as little girls they always wore black. Maybe the contrast between their skin and their hair and clothes makes their skin look whiter than it really is. The only other color on them is bright red nail polish and lipstick. They've been wearing those ever since they were teenagers.

"The last few years, they have always worn black capri-slacks and black pullover tops with short sleeves and low necklines. So if you see 2 pretty but odd looking barefoot girls with black hair and black capri-slacks, they're the Grimes Twins."

"Barefoot?"

"I've never seen shoes on them. I don't know how they do it, but they go barefoot even in the snow."

"What about at school?"

"They were taught at home by governesses."

In the short time Elizabeth is gone, the Sheriff does not have time to tell Erskine much more.

In the tower room, Elizabeth says, "Carolyn, you cried when I asked why you are afraid of Angelique Bouchard and the Grimes Twins. Mr. Erskine wants to ask you why you are afraid of Mr. McGuire. He says it might help him to find Daddy. It _might_ help. We can't be sure. Do you want to tell him? Or tell me and I will tell him?"

Carolyn thinks about it. Then she says, "Let's go."

In the drawing room, Carolyn says, "Mommy, can ... _may_ I speak to Mr. Erskine alone?"

"What! Carolyn, if McGuire hurt you, I want to know it!"

"He never touched me, Mommy. You didn't let him. But I want to talk to Mr. Erskine alone."

Elizabeth turns to Erskine and says, "Mr. Erskine, do you have any children?"

"My wife and I have a 16 year old daughter. She got her drivers license this year, which is why I have some gray hair now."

"Then you should be able to appreciate my concerns. You be very careful questioning my daughter. Carolyn, I will be right outside. Bill, shall we go?"

Malloy and Elizabeth leave Erskine and Carolyn alone in the drawing room. Elizabeth paces the hallway outside like a caged animal.

"Mr. Erskine," says Carolyn, "I want to show you something. Please stay where you are."

Erskine remains standing in front of his chair while Carolyn takes 10 paces away from him. She turns and says, "Hold your hand in front of your mouth and make believe it's someone's ear. Whisper something, just like you would whisper it in someone's ear."

Erskine is puzzled by Carolyn's request, but he complies.

Carolyn smiles at him and says, "Thank you, Mr. Erskine."

"For what?"

"You said, 'Carolyn and her Mommy are very pretty.' "

Erskine is shocked. "That's right! How did you know?"

"I have su-per-sens-i-tive hearing." She says "su-per-sense-i-tive" slowly and carefully, to be sure she gets it right. "When Grandpa found out about it, he called me 'Superears,' kind of like Superman. I liked that. I didn't like the way everyone else acted about it."

Carolyn sits on the left end of the sofa, where Julia Hoffman will sit 10 years later when she interrogates Elizabeth about her bizarre English cousin. Only then does Erskine sit.

"How did they act?"

"I thought everyone could hear as good ... as _well_ as I can, until the 1st day of kindergarten. Teacher made us sit in a circle and ... in-tro-duce ourselves to each other. When I said my name was Carolyn Stoddard, a bad boy named Nicky Blair whispered in another boy's ear, 'Her mommy is Eliz-a-bitch Collins Stoddard.'

"I walked across the circle saying, 'My Mommy's name is Eliz-a-_BETH_, not Eliz-a-bitch!' And then I hit him.

"Teacher hit me on the bottom with a paddle for hitting Nicky. I told her I did not care how many times she hit me with the paddle, I would still hit anyone who called Mommy names. She said, 'You musn't do that, Carolyn. Just say, Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.'

"I told her that was a lie and she hit me with the paddle again. I told her it was still a lie, and it would always be a lie no matter how many times she hit me. That's when she called Mommy.

"When Mommy got to kindergarten, she told me that sticks and stones stuff too." Carolyn fights not to cry, she has too much to tell Erskine to waste time crying. "That's the only time Mommy ever lied to me. I told her sticks and stones was a lie, same as I told teacher.

"And then Mommy did something teacher did not do. She asked me how I knew what Nicky said if he whispered it. I said I heard it, same as if he said it out loud. I looked at her like it was a stupid question. That's when I found out no one else could hear what someone whispered in someone's ear. That not being heard was the whole point of whispering."

"Did Mr. McGuire whisper something and you heard it? Is that why you were afraid of him?"

"No." Carolyn is still fighting not to cry, and it is getting harder. "Mr. Erskine, you have to promise you will never tell anyone what I am about to tell you. Not even Mommy."

"If McGuire hurt you ... "

"He never touched me! I told Mommy the truth. But if you don't promise, then I can't tell you."

"All right, Carolyn, I promise I will never tell anyone, unless you give me permission."

"OK." Still fighting not to cry, Carolyn takes a deep breathe. "I also have a su-per-sens-i-tive nose. The way everyone acted about my Superears, I kept my Supernose a secret. I didn't even tell Mommy. You are the 1st person I've ever told."

Carolyn tells Erskine about the Man Smell and the Woman Smell. She tells him how she thinks the Man Smell and the Woman Smell are Things Ladies Don't Talk About, which is another reason she has kept her Supernose a secret. She tells him about throwing up at Uncle Roger's and Aunt Laura's wedding.

The hairs on Erskine's arms stand straight up. So do the fine hairs on the rest of his body. His scalp tingles as the hairs on his head try to stand straight up. "My God," Erskine thinks, "Carolyn can smell lust on a person."

Carolyn tells him how her Daddy brought Mr. McGuire to Collinwood. And then she starts to cry. "Mr. McGuire had the Man Smell on him. He looked at ME and he had the Man Smell on him!" Now she is sobbing and trembling with the memory of the fear she felt when she smelled the Man Smell on McGuire.

Erskine says gently, "Carolyn." He gets up, picks up Carolyn from the sofa, sits down in her place, and puts Carolyn down on his lap. He puts his arms around her. She clings to him as she sobs.

"Carolyn, it's all right. Your Mommy will never let McGuire hurt you." Erskine hates himself for saying this, after advising Mrs. Stoddard to consider Carolyn as already dead if McGuire shows up at the door with Carolyn already in his hands.

"Carolyn, you were right to be afraid of Mr. McGuire. He is a very bad man. That is why I am trying to catch him. Any man who has the Man Smell on him when he looks at a little girl like you is a bad man. The same goes for any teenage boy who has who has the Man Smell on him when he looks at a little girl like you. Stay away from any man or boy like that.

"But when you are a teenager, you will be even prettier than you are now. So pretty that every teenage boy who looks at you will have the Man Smell on him. And so pretty that many grown men who look at you will have the Man Smell on them.

"If I come back to Collinwood when you are a teenager, you'll be so pretty that _I_ might have the Man Smell on me."

Carolyn pushes herself away from Erskine's chest and looks at him. "I won't be afraid of you." She kisses Erskine on the cheek. "I told you why I was afraid of Mr. McGuire. Will it help you find my Daddy?"

Erskine has an idea about that. "Maybe. I have to talk to your Mommy and the Sheriff. I won't tell them about your Supernose.

"Carolyn, I'm sure your Mommy has told you not to talk to strangers."

"Yes, she did. And no I don't talk to them."

"Good. And you must not talk to them when you are a teenager. But as I told you before, when you are a teenager, every teenage boy who looks at you will have the Man Smell on him. And many grown men who look at you will have the Man Smell on them. That includes both strangers AND teenage boys and grown men that you know. Most of them will be harmless, they will have the Man Smell on them just because you will be so pretty. But some of the boys and men you will know then will be just as bad as Mr. McGuire. So be very careful which teenage boys you go on dates with. And don't let ANY grown man with the Man Smell on him get you alone somewhere. OK?"

"OK." Carolyn has almost stopped crying now.

"Carolyn, I have to ask you one more question before I talk to your Mommy and the Sheriff." Erskine swallows hard and takes a deep breath. "Carolyn, your Mommy told me that you are also afraid of Angelique Bouchard and the Grimes Twins. Do ... do they have ... the Woman Smell on them when they look at you?"

Carolyn is crying full force again. She clings to Erskine's chest again. Between sobs, and gasping for breath, Carolyn says "No! No! They ... they smell ... _evil_!"

**Notes **

A. Ford was the primary sponsor of _The FBI_, therefore all of the cars in the show were products of the Ford Motor Company. The narration and words-on-the-screen in the opening titles of each episode began, "The Ford Motor Company presents ... _The FBI_ ..."

Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows_ was a Warner Brothers Picture. _The FBI_ (1965-1974) was "... a Quinn Martin Warner Brothers Production ... " (as the narration put it), starring Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. as Inspector Lewis Erskine. The original _Dark Shadows_ made its debut on June 27, 1966, during the 1st season of _The FBI._ Both shows were broadcast by ABC.

I was working on _Elizabeth's Secret_ when Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. died.

The pre-title sequence of each episode of _The FBI_ showed the commission of a crime. Then the picture froze and the opening theme played as words appeared on the screen. The words told viewers the name(s), file number, and offense(s) of the perp(s) in that episode.

The 1st season episode "Long March Up a Steep Hill" was about a bank robber. The file number began with "91-". During the episode, both Assistant Director Arthur Ward and Inspector Erskine referred to the case as a "91." Therefore, I assume the 1st part of the file number is a code for the perp's offense. In 2 episodes about kidnappings, "To Free My Enemy" (season 1) and "The Satellite" (season 2), the file number began with "7-".

Karen Black, who later starred in the Dan Curtis Productions _Trilogy of Terror_ (1975) and _Burnt Offerings_ (1976), played the kidnapper's girlfriend in "The Satellite." She drove a blue 1961 Ford 4-door sedan.

The "62766" in McGuire's file number is for June 27, 1966 (see above).

Most of the file numbers ended with the perp's last initial. But some episodes were mysteries where the pre-title sequence did not reveal whodunit. In these episodes, the file number ended with "-X", presumably X for "Unknown." I have ended McGuire's file number with "M" for his name and "X" for where his file ended up.

B. During the 1st season of _The Andy Griffith Show_, Sheriff Andy Taylor's patrol car was a black and white 1960 Ford 4-door sedan. In Burton's _Shadows_,the light bar on the Sheriff's white 1968 Plymouth Fury was a red Twin Beacon Ray.

C. Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney played the leads in the movie _One Fine Day_ (1996).


	5. Chapter 5 Secrets

**_Dark Shadows: _****_Elizabeth_****_'s Secret: _Part**** 5 "Secrets" **

**This is a prequel to Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows, _including the deleted scenes that are included on the Blu-Ray Disc. It is also a prequel to my fanfiction _Dark Shadows 2_, which I am still working on. **

**The name in parenthesis following the 1st mention of a character is the actor who would play that character in a movie version of this story. (I can dream, can't I?) **

**I do not own _Dark Shadows_ or _The FBI_ or any of their respective characters, institutions, or entities.**

"You know, honey ... everyone in this house has at least one big, scary secret.  
>Yours can't be all that bad." - Dr. Julia Hoffman to Victoria Winters at the end of Scene 108,<br>the last deleted scene on the Blu-Ray Disc of _Dark Shadows_

"Mommy, where's Daddy?  
>He's been gone for so long.<br>Is he ever coming home?" - Carolyn Stoddard introducing "The Ballad of Dwight Fry" at the Collinwood Happening

October 1962  
>Sheriff Bill Malloy's white '60 Ford, Special Agent Lewis Erskine's blue '61 Ford, and Elizabeth Collins Stoddard's yellow '57 Chevy station wagon stop at the Sheriff's Department impound lot.<p>

Erskine has asked Elizabeth and Carolyn to look at the stolen Cadillac and tell him if anything in it belongs to Paul Stoddard. Elizabeth was so tired and worried at that point that she almost blew it: she almost said, "There is nothing of Paul's in that car." To which Erskine would have asked, "How do you know?"

Erskine has also asked that Elizabeth and Carolyn look separately, so that the answers of one will not influence the answers of the other. This is certainly a valid procedure, but in this case it also has another purpose.

Elizabeth goes 1st, while Malloy shows Carolyn around the Sheriff's office. Elizabeth is relieved to be able to truthfully say that nothing of Paul's is in the Cadillac, not in the interior, nor the glove compartment, nor the trunk. And she is relieved to see that she left nothing in the car - or so she thinks.

Now it is Carolyn's turn. At Erskine's request, he was alone with Elizabeth while she looked, and now he is alone with Carolyn - while she examines the car with her nose as well as her eyes. Sheriff Malloy and Elizabeth go into the Sheriff's office to do the paperwork on Elizabeth's permit to carry a concealed weapon - which the Sheriff now considers vital after what Erskine has told him about McGuire.

But Elizabeth is even less happy about leaving Erskine and Carolyn alone with McGuire's stolen car than she was about leaving them alone in the drawing room. What if Carolyn tells him Mommy left the house after Carolyn told her about McGuire's car not driving away until long after Daddy's car did?

Carolyn is obviously frightened as she approaches the car.

"Forget it, Carolyn," Erskine says. "I don't want you to do this if it frightens you so much."

"It's all right, Mr. Erskine. I'll do anything to help you find my Daddy."

She takes a sniff while standing beside the driver's seat, and then recoils from it. She moves back in and takes a 2nd sniff and then a 3rd. She looks puzzled. "Mr. McGuire sat here," she says. "I smell a lot of him. But Daddy never sat here." She goes around to the passenger's seat. "Daddy never sat here either. But I smell a little bit of Mr. McGuire."

"That makes sense," Erskine thinks. "McGuire steals easy cars, the ones owned by dumb-asses who leave the keys in them. He probably slid in from the curbside when he saw the keys in the switch."

Out loud Erskine says, "Carolyn, why did you look puzzled while sniffing the driver's seat?"

"I smelled more than one person there. McGuire was one of them. But Daddy was not." She is telling Erskine the truth, but omitting certain details.

Erskine assumes Carolyn smelled the rightful owner of the car as well as McGuire and does not ask her for more details. His assumption is correct, but incomplete.

Carolyn steps into the car through the passenger door and onto the floor in front of the back seat. "Daddy was never back here either." She steps out of the car and walks around to the trunk, which is closed.

Carolyn is close to crying as she says, "Please open the trunk, Mr. Erskine."

Erskine has been wondering how to lead up to the trunk, but now he is disturbed by Carolyn's request.

"Carolyn ... "

"The bad people on TV sometimes kill people and put them in car trunks. I have to know if Mr. McGuire did that to my Daddy! Please open the trunk!"

It's been a long time since Erskine trembled when dealing with a witness, but his hand is shaking as he tries to put the key (on the keyring that Elizabeth dropped into this trunk) into the trunk's keyhole. Carolyn puts her little hand on top of Erskine's big hand.

"It's all right, Mr. Erskine. I have to know."

"All right, Carolyn." He gets the trunk open.

Carolyn leans toward the trunk and takes a cautious sniff. Then she leans in further and inhales deeply. "Daddy was never in the trunk!" she cries with joy. "Daddy was never in the trunk!"

"Thank God," Erskine thinks. Out loud he says, "What about McGuire?"

"I can only smell a little bit of him. Maybe he had a suitcase in here?"

"Yes, that's probably it." Erskine closes the trunk. "Thank you, Carolyn. I know this wasn't easy for you. If we find your Daddy's car but don't find him with it, will you smell it for me too?"

"Yes, Mr. Erskine."

Carolyn holds Mr. Erskine's hand as they walk to the Sheriff's office. She does not tell him that she smelled Mommy as well as McGuire on the driver's seat.

* * *

><p>Sheriff Bill Malloy and Special Agent Lewis Erskine watch Elizabeth and Carolyn drive away in the yellow '57 Chevy station wagon.<p>

**FLASHBACK, to the morning of the day Lewis Erskine came to Collinwood:  
><strong>Lewis Erskine, SAC Boston, sits at his desk in the Boston Field Office, reading a stack of reports.

In the outer office, Thelma Dayton (Marley Shelton), Erskine's secretary, is typing a report to Washington. The door to the hall opens and Sue Landers (Emma Watson, in a black wig), a pretty black-haired clerk from the Communications Room, runs in. She hands a sheet of teletype paper to Thelma.

Thelma reads it, and then gets up and goes to the door of Erskine's office. She usually knocks before entering, but not this time.

A startled Erskine looks up as Thelma enters. Before he can ask, "What's up?" , Thelma holds out the teletype and says, "Jason McGuire."

Erskine leaps out of his chair and snatches the paper from Thelma's hand. After reading it, he goes to the file drawer where he keeps maps of every state in New England. He quickly finds Collinsport on his copy of the Maine Official Highway Map.

"Thelma, call Sheriff Malloy. Tell him to consider McGuire armed and dangerous. Ask him to relay that to Mrs. Stoddard. Also tell him I'm on my way up there - and to keep _that_ to himself. Ask him to recommend a local motel, and then make me a reservation there. Be sure to tell him about our budget restrictions.

"Call the Lab boys and tell them to hit the road to Collinsport, _now_. Tell them to gather what they can at the scene, then put the whole car on a flatbed truck to Washington, where the Main Lab can take it apart.

"Then call Boston PD. Ask them to search the airport parking lot for stolen cars. One of them will probably have a raped and murdered girl in the trunk."

Erskine turns to Sue Landers. "Sue, send 4 teletypes. One: Tom Colby, SRA Portland. Refer him to this ..." (Erskine holds up the teletype Sue just brought him) "... and tell him I'll see him on my way to Collinsport.

"Two: the File Review Section of the Identification Division in Washington. I want _everything_ they have on Stoddard, his wife and her family, and the town of Collinsport itself. Tell them to send all that to Colby, I'll pick it up from him.

"Three: Assistant Director Arthur Ward, also in Washington. Refer him to this teletype, and tell him I'm on my way to Collinsport.

"Four: tell every law enforcement agency in the northeast to be on the lookout for Stoddard's car, and Stoddard and McGuire themselves. Tell them that McGuire is armed and dangerous. He's probably changed cars again by now, but send it anyway. And tell them to check airport parking lots for Stoddard's Jaguar.

"And now _I _will do the really hard part: calling my wife and telling her I won't be home for a night or two - again."

Erskine spends so much time traveling on short notice that he keeps a packed suitcase in the closet of his office. He is on his way a few minutes after calling his wife.

When Erskine arrives at the FBI office in Portland, Maine, Tom Colby (Senior Resident Agent Portland) tells him, "Mr. Erskine, I'm afraid I can't go to Collinsport with you. I have a lead on those truck highjackers, the ones who almost killed the last driver they hit. I have to follow it up _now_. I'll send one of my men with you."

"That's OK, Tom. I don't need a partner on this trip. McGuire is long gone from Collinsport. But this is the closest behind him we've ever been. That's why I'm handling it myself. Do you have a teletype for me?"

"I have 4 of them. The 1st is from Mr. Ward." Colby hands the teletype to Erskine. "He rescinded your order to send McGuire's car to Washington on a flatbed truck."

"What?!" Erskine reads the teletype. Assistant Director Arthur Ward has called in the Air Force. The flatbed will take the Cadillac to the Portland airport, where it will be loaded onto a C-130 Hercules transport plane and flown to Washington. That's how badly Ward wants McGuire. The Air Force wants him too - one of McGuire's victims was the daughter of an Air Force Master Sergeant.

"More power to him," Erskine says with a smile when he finishes the teletype.

Colby hands him the 2nd teletype, and says, "This one is from File Review. You're not going to like it."

Erskine takes the paper from Colby and reads, "All info Re: Collinsport, Me. is in the custody of XF. Do we forward your request to SADV?"

Erskine groans. Colby had groaned too when he read the message, even though it does not directly concern him - and he thanks God for that.

With the abbreviations spelled out full length, the message would read: "All information regarding Collinsport, Maine is in the custody of the X-Files. Do we forward your request to Special Agent David Vincent?"

By the direct order of J. Edgar Hoover, the X-Files and Special Agent David Vincent are always referred to by their initials. Even during conversations inside FBI offices, they are always referred to by their initials. It is Hoover's way of pretending they do not exist - even though he authorized Vincent to set up the X-Files in 1938. Vincent was SAC Boston back then, and led the FBI men who participated in a Federal raid on a certain small fishing village in Massachusetts. With Prohibition over, their post-raid cover story was that they busted a huge dope smuggling ring. When Vincent showed Hoover what they actually found, Hoover authorized him to set up the X-Files.

Erskine tells Colby, "I'll probably regret it, but send a reply to File Review: Affirmative."

The 3rd teletype is also from File Review, and concerns one Daniel Collins, father of Elizabeth Collins Stoddard.

Mr. Collins was commissioned as an ensign in the U.S. Navy in 1917. After World War I, he remained in the Naval Reserve until 1959, when he retired with the rank of Captain. He was recalled to active duty in World War II and the Korean War.

At the Battle of Okinawa, Collins' ship was hit by a kamikaze. Another Collinsport native, one William Loomis, carried Collins and 2 other badly wounded men out of a burning compartment. He was going back for a 4th man when he collapsed from loss of blood from his own wounds. Loomis spent the rest of the war in various Naval Hospitals. He was awarded the Navy Cross for his valor.

But Okinawa was the last straw for Loomis. He had survived the sinking of the battleship _Oklahoma_ at Pearl Harbor and the sinking of the carrier _Wasp_ in 1942. After he was released from the hospital and discharged from the Navy, he started drinking. After multiple arrests for drunk and disorderly and losing 4 jobs on fishing boats, Mr. Collins had hired Loomis to work at Collinwood. He has been there ever since.

The 4th teletype is from Boston PD. They found a stolen car with New Jersey plates at Logan Field. The body of a teenage girl was in the trunk.

* * *

><p>"What?" says Erskine, as he snaps out of his reverie.<p>

The Sheriff says, "I said, 'A penny for your thoughts, Mr. Erskine.' "

"Collinwood is quite a house. And Mrs. Stoddard is quite a woman ... and little Carolyn is quite a girl. If Paul Stoddard left them of his own free will, then he is a damn fool. The biggest damn fool I've ever heard of in this job, and that's saying something."

* * *

><p>Carolyn usually sits next to the window to watch the scenery go by. But driving back to Collinwood from the Sheriff's, she sits next to Mommy and clutches Mommy's dress. Mommy knows this means Carolyn is frightened.<p>

"Carolyn, what happened at the Sheriff's? Why are you afraid?"

"Daddy didn't come home. And the policemen haven't caught McGuire yet." She's crying now.

Mommy steers with her left hand and holds Carolyn tight with her right. Carolyn cries and Mommy holds her in silence until they are half way up the long driveway to Collinwood. Then Mommy stops the car and turns off the engine.

Carolyn is confused and a little scared by this. Mommy has never done this before. "Mommy, why did you stop?"

"Carolyn, you and Mr. Erskine have a secret." Mommy sees and feels Carolyn tense up at this. "And I will not ask you what it is." Mommy sees and feels Carolyn relax. "How would you like it if you and I had a secret?"

"What secret, Mommy?"

"You must never tell anyone, Carolyn. Mr. Erskine is keeping your secret. If I tell you my secret, you must keep it just like Mr. Erskine is keeping your secret. You can never tell anyone. Not Mr. Erskine or the Sheriff. Not even Grandma and Grandpa. Not Uncle Roger and Aunt Laura. Not even your Daddy when he comes home."

Elizabeth feels like she is lying to Carolyn, saying "... when he comes home." She is already thinking in terms of, "... _if_ he comes home."

"OK, Mommy. I will never tell anyone. I promise, cross my heart and hope to die." She crosses her heart, and tells herself, "I hope to die if I tell anyone Mommy's secret." Carolyn is so fascinated by whatever it is that Mommy is talking about that she has stopped crying.

"Pinkie swear?" Mommy holds out her right pinky finger.

"Pinkie swear!" Carolyn replies, hooking her pinkie around Mommy's and shaking it. She is actually smiling now.

"OK, Carolyn," Elizabeth says. She pauses to take a deep breath. "McGuire will never come back to Collinwood. And he will never hurt you or anyone else. I know that McGuire will never come back and I know he will never hurt you because I know he is dead."

"How do you know that?" Carolyn asks with a mixture of surprise and desperate hope.

"That is my secret. A secret that is so big that I can't even tell you. But I know that McGuire is dead and I know he will never hurt you."

"Shouldn't you tell the policemen so they don't wait their time looking for McGuire?"

"You mean so they won't _waste_ their time looking for him. Yes I should. But I can't. And the reason I can't tell them is one more secret that is so big that I can't even tell you."

To herself, Mommy says, "And it's not just my secret. It's Willie's secret too. I did not promise Willie in words that I would keep this secret, but I did promise and I will keep that promise."

Carolyn stares at Mommy for a long time. Then she holds out her arms for a hug. Mother and daughter hug each other tight, and Carolyn says, "I love you, Mommy."

"I love you too, Carolyn."

To herself Carolyn says, "I love you so much and I am so happy McGuire is dead that I will never ask you why you were in the driver's seat of his car. I can't ask you that anyway because you would ask how I know and I would have to tell you about my Supernose."

To herself Mommy says, "I love you more than life itself. I love you so much that if your Daddy ever comes home but brings another McGuire with him, then I will blow both of them to hell with my shotgun - even it means you hate me for killing your Daddy."

**NOTES  
><strong>A. June Dayton played Thelma, Inspector Erskine's secretary, in the 1st-season of _The FBI. _Sue Randall played Miss Landers, the school teacher, in _Leave it to Beaver_. She had a tiny part as an FBI clerk in _The FBI _1st-season episode "An Elephant is Like a Rope."

Marley Shelton played Victoria Winters in the unfinished and unaired 2004 _Dark Shadows_ pilot (see Note B.). She played FBI agent Rachel Young in the TV series _Eleventh Hour_ (2008- 2009). And she played Dr. Dakota Block in the Quentin Tarantino movie _Grindhouse_.

In Tim Burton's version of _Dark Shadows_, Helena Bonham Carter wore an orange wig to play Dr. Julia Hoffman and Eva Green wore a blonde wig in most of her scenes as Angelique. So Emma Watson can wear a black wig in to play her _roles_ in a movie version (I can dream, can't I?) of my _Dark Shadows _stories: the FBI clerk Sue Landers in "Elizabeth's Secret Part 5" and ... another character in a story I am still working on.

By casting Emma Watson as 2 characters in my _Dark Shadows _stories, I am complying with the _Dark Shadows_ tradition of one actor playing more than one character.

B. In the Quentin Tarantino movie _Pulp Fiction_, Jules Winfield (Samuel L. Jackson) explained what a pilot is.


End file.
